Moral causation; or, Notes on Mr. Mill's notes to the chapter on 'Freedom' in the third edition of his 'Examination of Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy';

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Moral causation: or Notes on Mr Mill's

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MOEAL CAUSATION

OR

NOTES ON MR MILL'S NOTES

TO THE CHAPTER ON 'FREEDOM'

IN THE THIRD EDITION OP HIS 'EXAMINATION

OP SIR W. HAMILTON'S PHILOSOPHY'

BY

PATEICK PEOCTOE ALEXAXDEE, M.A.

AUTHOR OF ' MILL AND CARLYLE, ETC. ETC.

SECOND EDITION
EEVISED AND EXTENDED

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS

EDINBUEGH AND LONDON

MDCCCLXXV

pjsoms'i

PRINTED By WILLTAM BLA-CKWOOD AND SONS.

PEEFACE.

Some short time after the publication of Mr John
Stuart Mill's 'Examination of Sir William Hamilton's
Philosophy ' I issued a little book entitled ' Mill and
Carlyle.' The first and larger portion of it was, in
effect, a criticism of Mr Mill's Chap, xxvi., " On the
Freedom of the Will," in which his success, as against
Hamilton, did not seem to be great, whilst his own
doctrine, as set forth in it — so at least I endeavoured to
show — was involved in the most serious confusions.
With the reception given to the work, I had, on the
whole, no reason to be dissatisfied. It met with
rather more recognition than I myself had ventured
to expect for it ; and on the appearance of Mr Mill's
Third Edition, I found that he had done me tlie honour
to controvert me in a series of " Notes " of some length
and elaboration. It did not appear to me that Mr
Mill took much by his attempt to invalidate my argu-
ments ; rather, it seemed that in nearly every instance
he could only evade my criticism by rushing into

iv Preface.

blunders more dreadM than those of which originally
I had sought to convict him. This I endeavoured to
show in a book called ' Moral Causation, being Notes
on Mr Mill's Notes,' &c. The success of this work
was, sooth to say, not much ; I am not aware that any
one ever either bought or read it ; and the notices of
it in the press were few, slight, and for the most part,
I rather think, contemptuous.

Meantime its reasonings remained unanswered; and
as I had sent Mr Mill a copy of the book, inscribed to
him with my best respects — this as the merest matter of
course — I consoled myself with the expectation that
more or less of his attention would be given to it
when he issued his Fourth Edition. It was therefore
with some surprise that I came upon this passage in
the preface to it : ' Of the assailants to whom I replied
' two only have published a rejoinder. Dean Mansel
' and Dr M'Cosh ; ' and that, on turning to the chapter
in question, I found the " Notes " to which I had re-
plied seriatim, reproduced without note or comment.
As it did not the least suit me to be thus dragged
through STiccessive editions at the wheels of Mr MOl's
conquering chariot, in a series of Notes to which, by
implication, I might seem to have been unable to
reply, whereas to my own satisfaction I had at almost
every point rebutted them, I decided to reissue my book
— in a revised and somewhat extended form — thus liv-
ing Mr Mill an opportunity of doing in his Fifth Edi-
tion what he had not done in his Fourth. This revise
I was in process of preparing when the news of Mr

Preface. v

Mill's death reached England. In the general sense
of sadness diffused by the premature extinction of so
great an intellectual light, my publication must have
seemed inopportune, and I therefore resolved to defer
it ; but the project may be now resumed. The appear-
ance of Mr MHl's 'Autobiography,' and, more lately,
of his three ' Essays on Eeligion,' has stirred a new
interest in his opinions on such subjects, which may
give to my criticism (in so far as it may be held in-
telligent) a pertinence which it might not otherwise
have possessed. Moreover, in the interval the subject
has lost none of its importance ; and as intimately
related to certain of the current controversies of the
time, it is constantly coming up for discussion. Any
little bit of accurate thought about it — supposing one
capable of such — might thus be held seasonable and
appropriate.

Mr Mill himself, as we learn from his Autobiography,
attached a rather special value to his own speculations
on this particular topic. At pp. 168-170 we find him
thus writing : —

'During the later returns of my dejection, the
' doctrine of what is called Philosophical Necessity
' weighed on my existence like an incubus. I felt as
' if I was scientifically proved to be the helpless slave
' of antecedent circumstances ; as if my character and
' that of all others had been formed for us by agencies
' beyond our control, and was wholly out of own power.
' I often said to myself, what a relief it would be if I
' could disbelieve the doctrine of the formation of char-

vi Preface.

' acter by circumstances ; and remembering the wish of
' Pox respecting the doctrine of resistance to govern-
' ments, that it might never be forgotten by kings, nor
' remembered by their subjects, I said that it would be
' a blessing if the doctrine of Necessity could be believed
' by all quoad the character of others, and disbelieved in
' regard to their own. I pondered painfully on the sub-
' ject till gradually I saw light through it. I perceived
' that the word Necessity, as a name for the doctrine
' of cause and effect applied to human action, carried
' with it a misleading association ; and that this associ-
' ation was the operative force in the depressing and
' paralysing influence which I had experienced ; I saw
' that though our character is formed by circumstances,
' our own desires Qan do much to shape those circum-
' stances ; and that what is really inspiriting and enno-
' bling in the doctrine of free-will, is the conviction that
'we have real power over the formation of our own
' character ; that our will, by influencing some of our
' circumstances, can modify our future habits or capa-
' bilities of willing. All this was entirely consistent
' with the doctrine of circumstances, or rather was that
' doctrine itself, properly understood. From that time I
• drew in my own mind a clear distinction between the
' doctrine of circumstances and Fatalism ; discarding
' altogether the misleading word Necessity. The theory,
' which I now for the first time rightly apprehended,
' ceased to be discouraging, and besides the relief to my
' spirits, I no longer suffered under the burden, so heavy
' to one who aims at being a reformer in opinions, of

Preface. vii

' thinking one doctrine true and the contrary doctrine
' morally beneficial. The train of thought which had
' extricated me from this dilemma seemed to me, in
' after years, fitted to render a similar service to others ;
' and it now forms the chapter on Liberty and Necessity
' in the concluding Book of my System of Logic' (It
is unnecessary to criticise the above statement, inas-
much as the intellectual confusions which are flagrant
in it will be found suf&ciently dealt with in Section viii.
of the book, and elsewhere.) Not all even of Mr Mill's
admirers, however, assign to his reasonings on this
subject the value which he himself did. Professor
Cairnes, in particular, has expressly recorded his dis-
sent — vide passage at the close of his interesting and
important paper in the ' Fortnightly Eeview ' of Jan-
uary last, " Mr Spencer on Social Evolution," in which
a doctrine is announced, identical with that set forth
in the following pages, as that which I believe to be
Hamilton's.

' But though the argument we have been pursuing
' does not necessarily involve the question of the Pree-
' dom of the Will, it cannot be denied that it comes
' into dangerous proximity with that quicksand of philo-
' sophic speculation — so much so, indeed, that one needs
' to guide his steps warily if he would avoid its perils.
' I call the question of the Freedom of the Will a quick-
' sand, because it is one in which, I frankly own, I have
' never been able to find solid footing. Mr Mill, as is
' well known, tried to explore it, and believed that he
' had reached firm standing-ground (System of Logic,

viii Preface.

' Book VI., Chap, ii.) He persuaded himself that he
' could reconcile the power of individuals, by an effort
' of wiU, to improve their own characters — to make
' them other than they would he but for the effort —
' with the fact that their conduct is determined in every
' act by the relation of the motives presented at the
' time to their characters as formed by all the influences
' which had acted upon them from birth to the moment
' of action. These two positions Mr Mill believed he
' could reconcile. For my part, I must acknowledge my
' inability to follow him through his demonstration.
' Both propositions are, to my apprehension, as true as
' the strongest testimony of consciousness can make any-
' thing, and I therefore accept them both, though I am
' unable to bring them into harmony. The position is,
' no doubt, unsatisfactory, but it seems to be the only
' one open under the circumstances ; for I fail to see
' the reasonableness of rejecting a truth supported by
' the strongest evidence vouchsafed to man, because I
' am unable to reconcile it with another which rests
' upon no better foundation.'

And the confusion which Professor Cairnes thus
justly suspects in the 'Logic,' he would have found a
little worse confounded in the chapter on Hamilton,
had he gone to seek for farther light there.

In the course of my argument, I was led into some
examination of Mr Mill's "Psychological Theory of
Mind" (see p. 149 e,t seq.), and could not but think it,
on the whole, an exceedingly shaky speculation. For
the sake of completeness, I include in the Appendix to

Preface. ix

this volume some criticism of the previous chapter, in
which Mr Mill sets forth his " Psychological Theory of
Matter." To these speculations also Mr Mill seems to
have attributed considerable importance. He speaks
of them with some complacency in his Autobiography,
as " having perhaps thrown additional light on some
of the disputed questions in the domain of Psychology
and Metaphysics ; " and the latter, the " Psychological
Theory of the Belief in an External World," he thought
it worth while to reprint in extenso at the end of the
first volume of his edition of his father's ' Analysis of
the Human Mind.' Some inquiry as to what, after
all, may be its real value, may thus be not without
interest, in aid of any estimate to be formed of Mr
John Stuart Mill as a Psychologist.

In parts of this volume there- is perhaps some tend-
ency to a little levity of treatment which, to certain
" well -constituted minds " — the subjects treated of
being of rather serious concernment — may possibly be
more or less distasteful. For this I should desire to
apologise, if I knew in what terms to do so. Writ-
ing pretty much to amuse myself, I choose to do
so as I go along ; and, this primary object attained, it
is my whim perhaps to be a little more indifferent than
I should be, as to whether, in thus amusing myself, I
may not be giving offence to here and there a solemn
and serious-minded reader ; but if this is to be rated a
sin, I submit it is not in the list of the deadly ones.

For the tone which, in certain passages, I find
I have allowed myself to adopt to a man like Mr

X Preface.

John Stuart Mill (of insolence as I fear it may be
held — or call it, if you will, impertinence), I have
only the same excuse to offer. I confess it seems
rather a poor one ; but I suppose no better can be
made of it : what I should probably have censured
in another, I do not care to defend in myself. But
I particularly beg that for what is merely a little
recklessness of literary statement, I may not be held
capable of doing wilful despite to Mr Mill ; a man to
whom beyond all others of our time — save only Mr
Thomas Carlyle — I acknowledge intellectual indebt-
edness ; who had in his life my sincerest admiration
and respect, and whose memory I hold in honour.

P. P. A.

INTRODUCTORY.

In the third edition, lately issued, of his Examina-
tion of Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy, Mr Mill has
made a general 'gaol-delivery' of his critics, giving
a list of them in his Preface, and in a series of Notes
distributed throughout the work, awarding to each —
on the spot, as it were, at which his crime was com-
mitted — such punishment as its measure of atrocity
might seem at his hands to deserve. In that list, as
author of a little volume entitled Mill and Carlyle,
I find myself included ; and in certain ' Notes ' of some
length to the chapter ' On the Freedom of the WiU ' —
on which subject it was that I presumed to call Mr
Mill's argument in question — I receive, in reward of
my presumption, such stripes as he has deemed due
to my offence. Mr MiU is so great a man, it would
almost be a pleasure to be kicked by him ; to be criti-
cised by him, I regard as mere honour done me, — and
would tender him, very sincerely, my thanks for his

A

2 Introductory.

little civilities. These I proceed to reciprocate, iu
some sort of free-and-easy fashion, by a series of Notes
on Mr Mill's Notes. Mr Mill having taken the trouble
to lorite me, as it were, it is the merest suggestion of
courtesy that he should not be left without reply.
Whatever comes from Mr Mill must needs be deserv-
ing of every attention, as coming from him, even if not
specially otherwise. What has here come from him —
some trivial points excepted, which I willingly score
in his favour — asks only a very little attention, to be
answered, as I venture to think, with quite conclusive
effect.

Against nothing in Mr Mill's observations — con-
ceived as they are throughout in that spirit of admir-
able courtesy which, as exercised to his other assailants,
he also extends to me — have I personal cause of com-
plaint. Complimentary, of course, they could not be ;
and if here and there they are edged with some touch
of caustic scorn, this also was merely of course, and, as
simply in the nature of the case, cannot possibly have
matter of offence in it. Mr Mill must either have
despised my reasonings, or conceived some little con-
tempt for Ms own ; had he chosen the latter alternative,
I should ever after have held him unworthy of the
name of Philosopher. To one only remark of Mr Mill
do I feel called upon to take objection, as havino- read
it with positive pain: — 'Mr Alexander's perpetual

Introductory. 3

' insinuations, and more than insinuations, of had faith,
' since he makes a kind of retractation of their grossest
' meaning, in one line of his essay, I pardon, as one of
' the incidents of his rollicking style.' As to the
epithet applied to my style, it seems neither here nor
there. Perhaps it is meant by Mr Mill as complimen-
tary ; and even were the reverse of a compliment
intended in it, this I should readily ' pardon/ as, it may
be, no more than ' one of the incidents ' of Mr Mill's
extreme distaste for certain of the arguments so con-
veyed, to which, as it seems, he can reply with no
better effect than we shall see him do. What does
give me real pain is, that .Mr Mill should suppose me
capable of supposing him capable of anything properly
to be termed ' bad faith.' What can I do, in such a
case, more than merely reiterate the frank disclaimer
already made, to which Mr Mill alludes ? Not guilty
— at least in intention — I once more distinctly plead.
If this be not enough for Mr Mill, who holds that ' the
' motive has nothing to do with the morality of the
' action,' I am helpless, except to suggest, that perhaps
his own Utilitarian Theory, which involves that extra-
ordinary dictum, is more blamable than I in the matter.
One instance only of this sin alleged against me does
Mr Mill condescend to adduce : — ' I venture to express
' my opinion in words borrowed from Mr Alexander,
' that it is not his "veritable consciousness." I will

4 Introductory.

' not imitate Mr Alexander in calling it " a fraudulent
' substitute palmed off upon him " by his philosophical
' system.' Mr Mill is at once over-sensitive here, and
seems a little to sin in misapprehension. In calling
' a substitute' frauchilent, as having passed a deceit on
Mr Mill, I could scarcely intend to imply in Mr Mill
fraud in his having been deceived by it. Between the
thimblerigger and his victim, I must seriously impress
on Mr Mill that the logical distinction is clear. It
seems odd he should force me to do such a thing.

Mr Mill (I beg pardon for lingering over this point,
but in relation to one or two of my coming criti-
cisms of Mr Mill it is essential it should be clearly
made out) permitted himself to insinuate against
Professor Mansel some suspicion of his tampering
with his intelligence in the interest of a certain
system of belief to which he stood pledged. To
Mr Mansel's slightly indignant rejoinder he now in
his turn rejoins that, while 'no imputation was in-
' tended, the effect of men's necessities of position on
' their opinions, as well as conduct, is far too widely
' reaching and influential an element in human affairs
' to be always passed over in silence for fear of offend-
' ing personal susceptibilities.' Might I venture to
suggest to Mr Mill, without seeming impertinent,
that no ' necessity of position ' can be more trying to a
man's candour than the position — as I take it, his own

Introductory. 5

— of standing fully committed before tlie world to a
helplessly bad argument ? I am not aware that Pro-
fessor Mansel is pledged to any of his beliefs more
deeply than Mr Mill intellectually is to what he calls a
' Doctrine of Moral Causation/ which is neither Freedom
nor Fate, but is supposed to hover somewhere between
the two. Suppose that by the rule of two and two
make four it should be proved that this darling
birth of Mr Mill's philosophical genius could positively
hover nowhere except in some liwho of the contra-
dictory or the unintelligible, what would be sure to
occur ? Mr Mill would instantly proceed to develop
the scepticism already latent in him as to any positive
necessity in two and two to be four. Believing, as
already he does {mi& pp. 86, 87),^ that perhaps there
may be somewhere a world in which two and two, on
coming together, are found to have sprouted a fifth, so
as to be accurately five, the inference could not but
come easy to him that perhaps occasionally in this
world such a thing might occur ; and ' the two and two '
of the argument would be shown — we need not doubt,
with much ingenuity — to be exceptional to the general
rule, in mere purchase of herrings or the like admitted.
But supposing all this, should we surmise in Mr Mill
' bad faith 'in it ? Not in the least ; only extremely

^ Mr Mill's third edition, from which, unless expressly it is other-
wise stated, all extracts are taken.

6 Introductory.

bad argument, almost in a manner forced upon him by
tbe sad ' necessity of position,' involved in his natural
affection as a parent for his rickety philosophical off-
spring. To ' look on truth askance and strangely ' is
almost of needs involved in the very taking up with its
opposite. The most candid of men will play a little
fast and loose with you iu argument, rather than admit
the error he is unable, as unwilling to see, in a hitherto
cherished opinion. Almost, I might say, that the man
who does not fear that, in such a case, he himself
might be found overlooking the thing before his eyes,
and seeing something else round the corner — turning
himself hither and thither, and, in order to evade a diffi-
culty, indulging in clever wily twists, which might do
credit to the old serpent — is somewhat over-confident of
his own virtue, and a little to seek in self-knowledge.
But a man may really not see the thing which is before
his eyes ; and in thinking he sees round the corner, his
lona fides may be as perfect as Mr Mill can possibly
desire that even his own should be considered. Some
little obliquity of vision I may have in the following
pages at points to allege in Mr Mill; but I only
allow myself to allege it as a natural obliquity —
under the ' necessity of position.' Imputation against
him of anything to be called ' bad faith ' most positively
and in toto I disclaim. jSTevertheless, in case some
offence should again arise in the trick of indiscreet ex-

Introductory. 7

pression, might I simply beg of Mr Mill once more to
make charitable allowance for it, as ' an incident of my
rollicking style.' I admit it the reverse of Academic,
but in vain should I toil to make it so. Be it ' rollick-
ing,' as Mr Mill styles it, or ' disgustingly flippant,' as
others have been good enough to call it, I fear it is
quite past praying for. "Without more ado of preface,
already more than enough, I pass to the consideration
of Mr Mill's Notes, as they occur in his Book, seriatim.

Causes.

Me Mill's NoTE^^a^e 554-.

' Sir W. Hamilton ttinks it a fair statement of the
Free-will doctrine that it supposes our volitions to he un-
caused ; but the " Inquirer " considers this a misstatement,
and thinks the real Free-will doctrine to be that " 7" am
the cause. I prefer the other language as being more con-
sistent with the use of the word cause in other cases.' ' In-
stead of saying that " 7" am the cause, the Inquirer should
at least say some state or mode of me, which is different;
when the effect is different ; though what state or mode
this could be, unless it were a will to wiU (the notion so
justly ridiculed by Hobbes), it is difficult to imagine. I
persist, therefore, in saying, with Sir W. Hamilton, that
on the Free-will doctrine volitions are emancipated from
Causation altogether.'

I am not, of course, concerned to defend the ' In-
quirer ; ' but I may note, in passing to what more
properly touches myself, that he has at least the
authority of Eeid, whatever it may be worth, for his
mode of stating the case. Yide, Eeid — ' A free, action
' is an effect produced by a being who had power and

lo The Man himself as Cause.

' will to produce it ; therefore it is not an effect without
' a cause.' Elsewhere — ' The cause must either be the
' person himself, whose will it is, or some other being.
' The first is as easily conceived as the last. If the
' person was the cause of that determination of his own
' will, he was free in that action,' &c. — (Tidd on the
Active Powers.) The statement of the 'Inquirer' is
thus in so far justified ; but, along with Sir W. Hamil-
ton, I am quite in agreement with Mr Mill that this
announcement of ' I ' as the cause, is, on any ground of
mere logic (and as distinguished from the line of reas-
oning which seeks to carry the subject into a region
which transcends logic by identifying the wiU with the
mystery of the human personality), quite futile for the
purpose of the Free-will argument. 'If the person
' was the cause of that determination of his own wiU,
' he was free in that action.' How so ? Unless as
cause of that action the man had a power to do otherwise,
to constitute himself cause of a different action, he was
not, according to definition, free. And surely, to be
cause of one action implies in us no power, at the
instant, to abolish ourselves as cause of that action,
and become cause of another.

As to Mr Mill's difficulty about ' the state or mode
' of the me, which is different when the effect is dif-
' ferent,' I am unable to see how there should have
been difficulty for him in so exceedingly plain a matter.
Surely the desire is such a state or mode of the Me.
When we say that ' the man is the cause of his action,'
we must mean, if distinctly we mean anythinn-, the

The Man himself as Cause. 1 1

man, as at the instant, specially determined in desire'
— the desire of the man in fact — the motive} It seems
thus plain that by announcing 'the man' as cause,
nothing is really gained. We do not in the least evade
the force of the main argument of the opponent, which
represents the act as determined unconditionally by
the balance of the desires and aversions.

As to Mr MiU's ' Sir W. Hamilton thinks it a fair
statement,' &c., with his final 'Ipe7^sist, therefore, in
' saying, with Sir W. Hamilton, that on the Free-will
' doctrine volitions are emancipated from Causation
' altogether,' it may readily be shown that Mr Mill
here is plainly erroneous; and — though not, indeed,
without excuse in certain confusions of exposition in
his opponent — completely misapprehends Hamilton's
real doctrine. But of this hereafter, at large, apropos
of Mr Mill's Note, p. 582, in which he expressly
invites me to the discussion.

1 A motive is "a desire or aversion.'' For this clear, and every
way unexceptionable definition, I ratlier think the subject is indebted
to Mr Mill, though it is pointed at by previous writers, as by Hamil-
ton in his "Mental Tendency ;" by Leibnitz (in his curious con-
troversy with Clarke) when he says, " The Mind acts by virtue of
the Motives, which are its dispositions to act (des Motifs, qui sont ses
Dispositions a agir) ; '' and not improbably by many others. Mr Mill
does not, however, quite invariably confine himself to this use of the
word as defined by him. — (Yide page 83.)

Motiveless or uncaused volition — as to this, see Appendix, Note I.

12 Consciousness of Freedom.

II.

Note — page 565.

' In answer to the statement that " what I am ahh to do
" is not a subject of consciousness," Mr Alexander says
(p. 22 et seq.): — "Perhaps it is not; but what I/eeZ I am
" able to do is surely a subject of consciousness. As to Mr
" Mill's ' consciousness is not prophetic ; we are conscious of
" what is, not of what wiU, or can be,' it seems enough to say,
" that if we are conscious of a free force of volition continu-
" ously inherent in us, we are conscious of what is." If we
can be conscious of a force, or feel an abUity independently of
any present or past exercise thereof, the fact has nothing simi-
lar or analogous in all the rest of our nature. "We are not
conscious of a muscular force continuously inherent in us.
If we were born with a cataract, we are not conscious,
previous to being couched, of an ability to see. We should
not feel able to walk, if we had never walked, nor to think,
if we had never thought. AbUity and force are not real
entities, which can be felt as present when no effect follows •
they are abstract names for the happening of the effect on
the occurrence of the needful conditions, or for our expec-
tation of its happening.'

Consciousness of Freedom. 13

I must confess myself in some difficulty with the
clause I have put in italics, illustrated, as it is, by
what follows. If nothing is to be held valid as con-
scioiisness unless it can be shown to exist in con-
sciousness, antecedent to the special experience
through which it is in consciousness educed, it should
seem that the very possibility of consciousness is
denied, an impossible consciousness hefore, conscious-
ness being needed to constitute its validity. We are
not conscious of sensation, as Mr Mill seems good
enough to admit, 'independently of any present or
past exercise of our sensitive susceptibility; only
on the application of the appropriate stimulus, is the
organ stung into activity, and sensation evoked in
consciousness. We do not, however, on that account
discredit our consciousness of sensation. So of Force
— it may very well be, that solely by our exercise of
force, is that force revealed to us in consciousness ; is
it therefore to be denied, that when we consciously
exercise force, we are conscious of force in its exer-
cise ? Mr Mill would seem to maintain this ; and he
is welcome of course to his denial, though I cannot
profess to understand it.i

1 "Wlien a philosopher assures me that, in the act of knocking another
down, let ns say — in the light of the sole interview between Adam
Smith and Dr Johnson, which so much amused Sir Walter Scott,* it

* Note contributed "by Scott to Croker's Edition of Boswell : —
"Mr Boswell has chosen to omit, for reasons which will be presently obvious,
that Johnson and Adam Smith met at Glasgow; but I have been assured by Pro-
fessor John Miller that they did so, and that Smith, leaving the party where he

14 Consciottsness of Freedom.

'We are not conscious of a muscular force con-
tinuously inherent in us.' It is not asserted tliat
we are; not the less we are conscious, and only-
conscious, of ourselves, as living force, self-exer-
cised in various modes, of which the muscular mode
is one. 'If we are born with a cataract, we are
' not conscious, previous to being couched, of an
' ability to see ! ' Of this, after careful study, I can
make no more than an announcement of the not very

is perhaps allowable to suppose such a compliment as this passing
between two philosophers — he is conscious of no exercise of form or
power, except in the sense of knowing the meaning of his words, I
certainly do not understand him ; though I can quite understand how,
as accepting Dr Brown's Analysis of Causation — in which Power,
whilst retained as a word, is emptied of all real meaning, and virtually
extruded from the universe — he might come to make such an assertion.
And from this point of view it is, of course, that Mr Mill here writes
throughout. On the other hand, we find Professor Mansel, as repre-
sentative of a diiferent school of thought, thus writing : ' My first and
' only presentation of power or causality is thus to he found in mj' con-
' sciousness of myself willing ; every man who has been conscious of an
' act of will has been conscious oi power therein ; and to any one who
' has not been so conscious, no verbal description can supply the
' deficiency ' (Prolegomena Logica, p. 139). When divergencies of
thought are, as here, fundamental, all argument, of course, is simply
so much mere waste of words.

had met Johnson, happened to come to another where Miller was. Knowing
that Smith had heen in Johnson's society, they were anxious to know what had
passed, and the more so, as Smith's temper seemed much lUfQed. At first Smith
would only answer — ' He's a brute — he's a brute ! ' But on closer examination it
appeared that Johnson no sooner saw Smith than he attacked him for some point
of his famous letter on the death of Hume. Smith vindicated the truth of his
statement. ' What did Johnson say ? ' was the universal inquiry. 'Why, he said,'
replied Smith, with the deepest impression of resentment — 'he said, " You lie I'"

'And what did you reply!' 'I said, "You are a son of a ."' On such terms,"

concludes Sir Walter, '* did these two gi'cat Moralists meet and part ; and such
was the classical dialogue between two great teachers of Philosophy."

Consciousness of Freedom. 15

recondite fact, that in order to see we must first have
an eye to see with. 'We should not feel able to
' walk if we had never walked,' &c. Of course not;
and Mt Mill, in turn, will perhaps admit, that without
first heing able to walk, we should never either have
walked, or fdt able, so to do. But how these obvious
truisms, that we cannot see without eyes, or walk
without being able to walk, prove Mr Mill's conclu-
sion from them, that ' force is no real entity,' mean-
time remains obscure to me. They seem quite as
much to favour the opposite conclusion, that force, is
the only real entity, of the two perhaps the more
intelligible, and likely to meet with acceptance.

' It is of course possible that this may be aU wrong,'
writes Mr Mill ingenuously, instantly after delivering
himself as above. It is really just possible, even
though Mr MUL is the person so delivering himself.
That the Ego primarily reveals itself in consciousness
as an energy, and as such is, in consciousness, self-
recognised throughout, is an opinion which may be
held ; which has been held by philosophers of some
note ; which Professor rerrier,^ in particular, seems to
have a good deal to say for ; and which Mr Mill,
however for himself he may decline to entertain it,
win find it not easy to disprove. But in truth, it
would be idle to concern one's self further with what
seems merely a frivolous verbal dispute. The con-
sciousness of Freedom asserted is sufficiently defined

1 Vide "Eemains" — Introduction to the Philosophy of Conscious-
ness.

1 6 Consciousness of Freedom.

as a natural, universal, ineradicable belief, feeling, or
conviction of mankind, finding its ratification under
the ancient canon of Semper, ubique, ah omnibus.
About the ah omnibus there is, however, some little
difficulty ; for though some exceedingly stout ISTeces-
sitarians have admitted that they had such a feeling,
while clearly convinced of its absurdity, others of the
school, among whom Mr Mill is to be numbered,
protest they have not any feeling of the kind, nor
ever had.^ This ' practical feeling ' of Freedom — of a
power in us to have willed and done otherwise than
as we did — was never yet, that I know of, denied,
however, by any one who had not, as philosopher,
committed himself to the opposite theory. The sus-
picion, as inference, seems reasonable that the theory
and the denial stand related, as in some sort cause and
effect. From this point of view it was that I ventured
to suggest, as the proper authority in the matter, ' the
' general consciousness of the race, philosophers with
' rigour excepted.' Taking literally this sweeping ex-
clusion, really meant as no more than a bit of quasi-
humorous exaggeration (I admit there seems no mighty
humour in it), Mr Mill treats me, in regard of it, to a
little easy, but not, as it seems to me, exceedingly
felicitous sarcasm. ' If this,' he says (the tendency,
that is, to interpret facts in conformity with ' precon-
' ceived opinion'), ' be the normal effect of Philosophy;

^ Not in the strictest sense accurate as regards Mr Mill, who
steadily, and even, as we shall see, obstinately, declines to give any
distinct deliverance as to his genuine feeling in the matter. (See
next Section).

Consciousness of Freedom. 1 7

' if the effect of cultivating our power of mental dis-
' crimination be to pervert it, let us close our books,
' and accept Hodge as a better authority in meta-
' physics than Locke or Kant ; and, I suppose, in as-
' tronomy than Newton.' WeU, if tMs is not accurately
to be called the ' normal effect of philosophy,' which
has other effects less questionable, it is not unfre-
quently one effect. Does Mr Mill really deny this?
He can scarcely intend to do so, I should say, judging
from the remark (p. 620) in his comparison of Kant
and Hamilton — ' but in abihty to discern psychological
' truths, uiicoloured by a theory, he (Kant) seems to me
' inferior to Hamilton.' Kant, in his observation of the
facts of consciousness, had, it seems, then — in common
with Mr MiU and others — a trick of looking at them
through the coloured medium of his theories. Mr
Mill will perhaps not decline to admit that Hodge, as
not having any theories, has, at least to that extent,
distinctly the advantage of Kant. As to ' Hodge being
' a better authority in metaphysics than Kant, and, I
' suppose, in astronomy than Newton,' Mr Mill must
have been aware, in writing this, that he only attained
his little points at some expense of intellectual con-
fusion. But perhaps he was so pleased with his
points, he thought he had them cheap at the price.
As regards the particular consciousness in question, I
don't mind saying, with all plainness, that I consider
the despised Hodge — admitted somewhat the inferior
in the matters of astronomy and metaphysic — greatly
preferable, as an authority, to Mr MiU ; and if I can

B

1 8 Freedom as tested by Experience.

clearly show — as I shall find no difficulty in doing —
that Mr Mill, whilst quite declining to admit that he
has this feeling of Freedom, has it all the same, just as
Hodge has, I think I shall have shown fair ground for
my preference of the last-named philosopher.

Meantime, to proceed with Mr Mill's note : ' Mr
' Alexander denies that the belief that I was free to
' act can possibly be tested by experience, a posteriori;
' since experience only tells me the way in which I
' did act, and says nothing about my having been able
' to act otherwise.' What I said was in effect this, —
that experience — as Mr Mill uses the term in the pas-
sage I was engaged in criticising — experience, simpli-
citer, or in its separate items, as distinct from the
reasoned 'induction from experience,' on which he
elsewhere relies, and the force of the argument from
which it is fruitless to seek to evade,^ can ' neither con-
firm nor invalidate ' our consciousness of Freedom, as
asserted. On this obvious gTound — our sole possible
experience is, that of two alternatives we have chosen
one ; from this experience there can certainly be no
inference in us of a power to have chosen the other ;
and as little can there be inference in us of defect in
such a power ; for supposing such power to exist in us,
we could still have only chosen 07ie of the alternatives,
though, possibly, it might have been the other. Ex-
perience tells us what we did ; as to what we could

1 In so far, that is, as it amounts to a demonstration of the Causa-
tion of human actions ; but this, again, amounts, as we shall see, to
no contradiction oi the fact of human Freedom (p. 137).

Freedom: as tested by Experietice. 1 9

do, it tells us something ; as to the other thing which
we did not do, it makes no deliverance whatever,
either of could or covld not. Mr Mill's reply to
this ought, I think, as coming from such a man,
to take rank as a curiosity of literature, in this par-
ticular branch of it : — ' Mr Alexander's idea of the
' conditions of proof by experience is not a very
' enlarged one. Suppose that my experience of myself
' afforded two undeniable cases, alike in all the mental
' and physical antecedents, in one of which cases T
' acted in one way, and in the other in the direct
' opposite ; there would then be proof by experience,
' that I had been able to act either in the one way or
' the other.' There would, indeed, tTwn be proof, as
stated. But nobody living ought to know better than
Mr Mill, that his instance of experience supposed is one
utterly impossible; that 'two tmdeniahle cases, alike
' in all the mental and physical antecedents' never
occurred, or could occur, either in his 'experience of
' himself,' or in any other person's experience ; that the
mere difference in point of time, in itself inessential
for the argument, must needs involve and necessitate
other and most essential differences in the ' mental and
'physical antecedents,' so that the identity supposed
'undeniable' would not only be extremely deniable,
but is not, without plain absurdity, to be asserted.
Surely in the second of Mr MiU's two cases supposed,
there could not but be present a whole series of ante-
cedents, not present in the first; to wit, the highly
important series evolved hy the first case itself, the

20 Freedom as tested by Experience.

antecedent of having acted so, with other antecedents
to be summed as the intermediate result of his having
so acted. In this obvious consideration alone, were
there no others, Mr Mill's supposition is stultified. Its
futility may be further made manifest, by considering
how Mr Mill would deal with such a case as that put
by himself, if he found it alleged against him. Con-
stantly it occurs that a man who in certain circum-
stances has acted in a particular way, on a recurrence
of circumstances which se,em to be precisely similar, is
found, on some incalculable whim or caprice, to act in
a way quite different. Dr Eeid was capable of draw-
ing from such a case an inference of human Freedom.
Does Mr Mill admit the inference ? Not in the least ;
he would scout with scorn the notion that the two sets
of antecedents, however they might seem to be alike,
actually w&re so; and infer some subtle occult differ-
ence in the causes to account for the difference in the
effect. No amount of evidence would, in such a case,
avail to convince Mr Mill of the identity of the two
sets of antecedents. It is, however, possible, according
to Mr Mill, to find ' two undeniable cases, alike in all
' the antecedents.' Let us suppose Mr Mill to have
found them ; he has convinced himself, by an accurate
and exhaustive analysis, that ' all the antecedents are
alike;' the identity is to Mr MiU undeniable. And
now suppose— unless Mr MiU means boldly to beg the
question in his own favour, he must admit the legiti-
macy of the supposition — that much to Mr Mill's
surprise, a different action should in the second case be

Freedom as tested by Expe^Hejice. 2 1

found to ensue! Mr Mill would fhm be bound to
admit Freedom. But would he admit it % Nothing of
the kind, of course ; Mr Mill would merely hum and
haw a little, as men do when they find themselves in
difficulty ; surmise, as indeed he well might, that there
must have been some mistake; that his analysis of the
conditions could not have been quite so exhaustive as
he had supposed it; and conclude with resolutely
denying the identity before announced undeniable.
Certainly, wherever he might find himself at a loss, it
could scarce be in the reasonings by which he sought
to show that in announcing the identity undeniable,
he had been somewhat a rash philosopher, and more or
less oblivious of principles elsewhere by himself in-
sisted on. It would be well if Mr Mill, in this relation,
would bethink him of his own arguments, exhibiting
the futility of the 'Experimental Method,' as applied
to the phenomena of Society. They equally exhibit
its futility, as here applied by himself, to illustrate a
psychological problem. No more in the one than in
the other field, can the Past, by any possibility, repro-
duce itself with exactitude sufficient to ground any
valid induction. In a word, Mr Mill's supposed ' two
' undeniable cases, alike in all the mental and physical
' antecedents,' can exist only as a temporary hallucina-
tion in the brain of Mr Mill supposing them. My
'idea of the conditions of proof by experience' may
not be ' very enlarged,' but Mr Mill is not likely to
succeed in enlarging it by a fabrication of instances
outside of all possible experience, and which, were it

2 2 Freedom not to be tested by Experience.

fairly put to him, he could not but admit to be so.^ If
Mr Mill can only confute my argument as to experience,
by the putting of cases which could never in experience
occur, it seems plain that in seeking to confute, he has
somewhat forcibly confirmed it. I must therefore con-
tinue to think that in here writing as he did — ' If our
' so-caUed Consciousness of what we are able to do (of
' Freedom) is not horm out hy experience, it is a delu-
' sion,' Mr Mill exhibited some little misapprehension
as to the relation of Experience to the matter in hand ;
making Freedom, as test of its truth, demand from
experience a ratification, in the very nature of the case
impossible, were Freedom thrice over assumed.

As a mere point of curiosity, it is perhaps worth a
moment's consideration, to what extent the experience
which Mr Mill considers possible of 'undeniable cases
alike,' &c., supposing it not to confirm, would invalidate
our alleged consciousness of Freedom. Of tv)o alter-
natives we choose one. From the experience that we
did choose one, there is plainly no inference whatever
against our power to have chosen the other. No one
will be so absurd as to aUege in a man's choice of one
of two alternatives, a contradiction by experience of

1 I venture to presume Mr Mill would admit this, were it only on
the evidence of such passages as the following : — ' There is not one of
' the facts surrounding a human being, or of the events which happen
' to him, that does not influence in some mode or degree his subsequent
'mental history." 'It is certain that our mental states, and our
' mental capacities and susceptibilities, are modified, either for a time
' or permanently, by everything which happens to us in life ' (in
which last the clause 'for a time' had better, I think, be extruded
on grounds sufficiently obvious).— Zogrjc, vol. ii., chap. "Ethology."'

Freedom an 'Interpretation of Experience! 23

his consciousness of a power to have chosen eiiher of
the two. And now, suppose an ' undeniable case ' in
which all the antecedents are exactly reproduced, and
in which it is found that again this one alternative is
chosen. Experience, which before told us that the
man acted so, now tells us he has acted so twice,; but
it seems as far as before from telling us that he could
not have acted otherwise. Supposing a man free to act
otherwise, surely he might yet act so, and again and
again so act. And as of two cases, so it might almost
seem of two thousand — the two thousandth case of his
acting so, would prove no more than the first perhaps,
that he coidd not have acted otherwise. Experience
would simply assure us that the man had acted in the
one way two thousand times in succession. As the
cases are plainly supposititious, and could never in
experience emerge, it does not seem to matter a pinch
of snuff whether I am right or wrong in this.

In a postscript to the little Essay which Mr Mill has
honoured with some share of his attention, intended to
correct somewhat of suspected crudity in my first state-
ment of this particular point, I noted Mr Mill's aver-
ment that our so-called Consciousness of Freedom ' has
' no title to credence except as an interpretation of ex-
'perience, and if it is a false interpretation, it must
' give way ; ' and I did not seek to deny, that if it was,
as Mr Mill said, merely ' an interpretation of experi-
ence,' it ran some risk, as conflicting with Mr Mill's
' complete induction from experience.' But I asked of
what special ' experience ' it was that Mr Mill supposed

24 Freedom an ^ Interp7'etation of Experie^tce.

' it an interpretation ; ' and whether it was not wildly
absurd to suppose that we should habitually ' interpret '
our experience (the sole one possible for us) of having
done one of two things, into a consciousness of being
able to have done the otlier. Wild as seems the ab-
surdity, I cannot but think, Mr MOl, who offers no
explanation, is still fully committed to it. It might
indeed be alleged, in reply, that I ignore the previous
deliberative experience, of which probably it is — it
might be said, — and not of the immediate experience
of act, that Mr Mill considers our ' so-called conscious-
ness,' a mis- interpretation.' Two courses of conduct
are before us, and we are in doubt which to choose.
The mind oscillates between the two, considering now
one, now the other ; and feehng, whilst each is before
it, an inclination to choose it, and a sense of ability to
do so. Finally it chooses one; and recalhng those
items of the deliberative experience of which the other
was the object, it illusively transfers them to the in-
stant of act, and infers its ability at that instant to have
actually chosen, not the one it did choose, but the
other — infers, in a word, its Freedom. In this sense
our consciousness of Freedom might, with some plausi-
bility, be represented as an inference from, or interpre-
tation of, experience — which, 'if shown to be false,
must give way.' Had this been the ground occupied
by Mr MiU, the further inquiry would necessarily have
emerged, whether in the very experience interpreted
there was not already involved the authentic conscious-
ness of Freedom, said to be a merely erroneous ' inter-

Mr Mill in the right. 25

pretation ' of it ? But, as against Mr Mill, it is happily
not necessary to discuss this somewhat nice and obscure
question ; for of the saving suggestions above he cannot
in the least have the benefit. The ' experience ' he really
means is quite too clearly indicated — ' We never know
' that we are able to do a thing except from our having
' done it. We should not know that we are capable of
' action at all if we had never acted. Having acted,
' we know, as far as that experience readies, hoiu we are
' able to act', &c. ; and it seems positively to shut him
Tip to the surely rather ludicrous notion that we ' inter-
pret ' our doing of one thing to mean, not that we really
did that thing, but that we could have done — another}
A little further on in this ISTote (p. 566), I admit
correction at the hand of Mr Mill ; and I am aU. the
more bound to do so, that my falsely made point
against him was precisely of a kind likely to be rather
telling with the ruck of half-instructed readers — 'It
' would hardly be worth while to notice a pretended
' inconsistency discovered by Mr Alexander between

1 The account hypothetically here given of our conviction of Free-
dom, as merely a hallucinatory reminiscence of what takes place in
the process of deliberation, is plainly that pointed at hy Hume, when
in ' Note F (Essays),^ he says that ' the Will moves easily every, way,
' and produces an image of itself (or a velleity, as it is called iu the
' schools), even on that side, on which it did not settle.' The ques-
tion, a somewhat nice one, as to whether or no the origination of
our feeling of Freedom can be thus sufficiently accounted for,
I have not to discuss with Mr Mill, by whom it is not mooted.
Further on (p. 127), it will be found that I return to this point
— which I do not remember to have seen investigated — offering
simply so much remark on it as seems needful for the purpose in
hand.

26 Mr Mill in the right.

' what is here said and my recognition in a former work
' of a " practical feeling of Free-will," " a feeling of
' Moral Freedom we are conscious of," if Mr Alexander
' had not inferred from it that I " was at one time con-
' scions" of what I now, for the convenience of my
' argument, deny to be a subject of consciousness. Mr
' Alexander himself quotes the words in which I spoke
' of thi^ practical feeling of free-will as not one of
' free-will at all in a sense implying the theory,
' and took pains to describe what it really is.' The
justice of Mr Mill's criticism here I quite frankly
allow ; — the more readily that, without aid from Mr
Mill, I had already, on a reconsideration of the mat-
ter, detected the mistake I had fallen into. Dr
Johnson, once upon a time, when questioned by a
lady at a literary tea-party as to how he could pos-
sibly have been guilty of some trivial admitted error
in his Dictionary, answered with brusque candour,
' Ignorance, madam, was the cause of it — gross and
' inexcusable ignorance.' I suppose I may as well
emulate the Doctor, and simply admit here stupidity.
My stupidity, I admit, was gross ; and I have only
this little excuse to offer for it. When Mr Mill, in
the opening of his chapter on this subject in the
Logic, spoke of the 'practical feeling of Free-will
common to all mankind,' naturally, I humbly sub-
mit, though I grant very incompetently (the chapter
being studied as a whole), I supposed him to mean
the practical feeling in the matter, which really is
' common to all mankind ; ' and when he afterwards

Mr Mill in the right. 2 7

spoke of 'the sense of moral Freedom we are con-
scious of/ I merely went on in my blunder, omitting
to note sharply that this sense of moral Freedom
was expressly by Mr Mill defined as no more than
'a feeling of being able to modify our character,
if we, wish.' But this is not, I maintain, 'the prac-
tical feeling of Free-will common to all mankind,'
Mr Mill himself included. Mr Mill's own ' practical
feeling of Freedom' is something considerably more
than this. If — as with no great pains I hope to be
able to do presently — I can distinctly show this, I shall
not, indeed, have acquitted myself of misunderstanding
Mr Mill ; but, more or less, I may have made obvious
how it was that, not altogether inexcusably perhaps
(some admitted laxity in perusal allowed for), I came
to so misunderstand him.

28 Consciousness of Freedom.

III.

Note — -ipage, 567.

With a certain deep end of my own, premising that,
within the space of a minute, Mr Mill was to put his
finger to one side of his nose or the other, I desired to
be informed — apologising for the somewhat too homely
nature of the instance — ^whether, having touched the
left side of his nose, Mr Mill did not f&d he could
have willed to touch, and touched, its right side ?
This to more than one of my critics has seemed to
be shocking irreverence. The coarse insinuation that
Mr Mill has actually a nose, these critics have gravely
resented as an insult to so profound a philosopher.
Had I insinuated that Mr Mill was destitute of a
nose, I could have better understood their objection.
Mr Mill himself, in regard of my 'homely instance,'
is less sensitive than some of his friends, and has
nothing more savage to say of it than that it ' reminds
him of the asinus Buridani! 'Mr Alexander's naif
' expectation that his opponent's answer will be differ-
' ent, because of the futility of the example, reminds
' one of the asinus Bwiclani.' Seeing I purposely

Consciousness of Freedom. 29

constructed it somewhat on that model, I cannot be
at all surprised at this. From Buridan's puzzle it
differs but slightly; yet the two are not quite iden-
tical. Had I asserted that on Mr Mill's principles,
in the absence of any assignable motive to determine
him to touch one side of his nose rather than the other,
he could not, when asked to do so, have touched
his nose at aU on either side, the identity would
have been nearly complete. As it is, the similarity
is sufficient to account for Mr Mill's being reminded
of the more ancient example. In order to estimate
the value of Mr Mill's subsequent rejoinder here,
let me glance for an instant at the purpose with
which I was led to invent so apparently 'futile' a
case. I wished to try if by such a device it might
be possible to get Mr Mill to give to a conspicuously
plain question the plain answer, which he seemed
resolute to avoid giving. The question before Mr
Mill was the sufficiently simple one — doing so, don't
you feel you had power to do otherwise ?■ Have you,
or have you not, a consciousness, so defined, of Free-
dom ? This question, as I insisted, ' asks simply a
Yea or a Nay on a candid self-interrogation,' and is
not, except evasively, in any other terms to be an-
swered. But no answer in these frank terms was,
it seemed, to be had from Mr Mill. No answer at
all to the question put to him, Have you or no such
a consciousness ? was in fact to be had from Mr
Mill, who, instead of answering this question, kept
answering the entirely different one — Can this con-

30 Consciousness of Freedom.

sciousness of Freedom alleged give good logical account
of itself ? He persisted, as I said, 'in answering the one
question in terms suggested by the other ;' asking as to
his consciousness of Freedom, instead of the Yes or No
desired, we received in reply 'a synopsis of Neces-
sitarian argument.' As thus — ' I am told,' writes Mr
Mill, 'that if I elect to murder, I am conscious I
' could have elected to abstain. B%t am, I conscious
' that I could have abstained, if my aversion to the
' crime and my dread of its consequences had leen
' weaker than the temptation ? If I elect to abstain,
' in what sense am, I conscious that I could have elected
' to commit the crime ? Only if I had desired to com-
' mit it ivith a desire stronger than my horror of murder;
' not with one less strong! Mr Mill is told he is con-
scious of so and so, and implicitly the question is put
to him, Is it so, or is it not 1 The question thus put
to him Mr Mill answers by putting another question,
'But am I conscious,' &c. &c.? I take leave to say
that, in a sense, this is exceedingly Scotch metaphysics,
though I am confident no sample of the sort is to be
met with either in Eeid or Stewart. Mr Mill cannot
surely suppose that, in putting this other question, he
is answering the question put to him. If it be not
essentially another question, where is the force of the
hut with which he must needs preface it? His de-
liverance, in point of fact, amounts to this — But really
now, is this Freedom, about which you interrogate me,
capable of being construed to thought, or reduced to
a rational statement? Again — 'I therefore dispute

Mr Mill's evasion of the point. 3 1

' altogether that we are conscious of leing able to act
' in opposition to the strongest present desire or aver-
' sion.' Mr Mill is welcome to dispute modes of
consciousness which are not those asserted.'- But
surely nothing can be much more evident than
that a man who, when asked, Acting so, don't you
feel you could have acted otherwise ? insists, as
here and throughout, on rambling off into a con-
sideration of temptations, desires, and aversions, their
relative strength, and so on, has left the simple ground of
feeling or consciousness to expatiate on that of reason-

^ Our consciousness alleged of Freedom is practically, and surely
quite intelligibly, defined, as a feeling that doing so we had yet a
power to do otherwise. Freedom is thus practically and intelligibly
defined a power to do otherwise than as we do. Speculatively, it is
not intelligibly to be defined at all, the attempt at a speculative defini-
tion resulting in one or other of these forms of solecism — a power to
act without a motive, to originate a ' motiveless volition,' or a power
to act 'in opposition to the strongest motive,' involving the contra-
diction that the strongest motive is in point of fact not the strongest.
But nobody ever yet, that I know of, asserted a consciousness of
Freedom under either of these speculative forms of solecism ; and
until such a, mode of consciousness is asserted, Mr Mill, in 'dis-
puting ' it, has the dispute entirely to himself. He is merely setting
up a paltry puppet, the triumph involved in the bowling over of
which, and carefully setting it up again once more to bowl it down,
seems essentially a triumph of the poorest.

In vain would Mr Mill allege that ' to do otherwise than as we do, '
and to 'act in opposition to the strongest motive,' are really the same
thing. For — admitting it no otherwise to be conceived of — how did
Mr Mill become aware of this ? How but by a course of speculative
inquiry, leading him to a theory of human action as in every case
strictly determined by the balance of the desires and aversions.
And into the question of ' practical feeling ' or consciousness, to
intrude Ms speculative theories, is to evade the question in its proper
simplicity, and involve the whole matter in confusion.

32 Device in order to bring him to it.

ing. In aid of this vice of Mr Mill, who would plainly
never answer the question put in the frank terms of
Yea or Nay — which are really the only ones to be
tolerated — so long as escape was possible for him into
the region of motives, desires, and aversions, it occurred
to me to frame an instance for him, from which the very
ghost of anything to be called a rational motive seemed
excluded ; and, in hitting on the case suggested, of the
two sides of his nose, I considered I had indifferently
succeeded. Obvious accidents of disturbance excluded
— which perhaps to specify minutely might subject me
to a charge of further irreverence — it is impossible Mr
Mill should seriously allege anything to be called a
motive, for his touching the left side of his nose in-
stead of the right, which equally solicits a preference.
Motives are not here of course absent ; but merely so
rarefied, or attenuated, as utterly to elude appreciation
and defy articulate statement. If I allowed myself to
cherish ' expectation ' that in the absence of all motives
and desires assignable, Mr Mill might perhaps be be-
guiled into an answer, not hopelessly embarrassed hke
his previous ones, with considerations of motive and
desire, irrelevant to the question put to him, and only
pertinent to a wholly different one, that expectation is
indeed proved by the result, a na%f and even stupid
one. Mr Mill being asked,— having touched the left
side of his nose, does he feel or does he not, he could
have elected to touch the right side ? and passionately
entreated to answer so simple a question 'without
' bringing any of his logical great guns to bear upon it,'

Mr Mill persisient in Evasion. 33

thus answers, with what seems to me a very loud and
full salvo of thetn — ' I should, on the supposition which
' he makes, be aware (I wiU not say conscious) that I
' could have touched the right, had I so willed it ; and
' aware that I could, or even should have so willed, if
' there, had existed a sufficient inducement, not otherwise.
' If any one's consciousness tells him that he could ham
' done so without an inducement, or in opposition to a
' stronger indv,cement, I venture to express my opinion,
' in words borrowed from Mr Alexander, that it is not
' his " veritable consciousness." ' And now, may I
simply ask of Mr MiU — the disturbances of course
apart, at which I only timidly ventured to glance —
what shadow of anything to be rationally called an in-
ducement — either weak or strong — does his 'veritable
' consciousness ' inform him of, for touching, in the case
supposed, the side of his nose which he did touch, in
preference to the other 1 Would Mr Mill be good
enough to expound to us the inducement ? If he can-
not — and I believe him much too shrewd to commit
himself to such an attempt — is it not sufficiently obvi-
ous, that Mr Mill here, in obstinately declining, as be-
fore, to answer the question put to him in the desired
terms of Tea or Nay ; and proceeding to discourse with
philosophical gravity of inducements (of which the only
account to be given is, that for his steady purpose of'
evasion, he must needs imply or assert them), — simply
illustrates anew and more forcibly the confusion in
which he persists in involving the subject? Having
acted so, don't you feel you could have acted otherwise ?
c

34 Mr Mill's Evasions accoimted for.

Yes or No ? To this conspicuously plain question, it
seems, a plain answer cannot be coaxed from Mr Mill,
even if we concoct charms for him. Cart-ropes, per-
haps, could not drag it out of him ; and it may even
be, that his philosophical constancy in the matter
might emulate that of the martyr, and be proof against
the ' torture of the boot,' if applied.

When a gentleman in the witness-box steadily de-
clines to answer a plain question put to him ; escapes
upon an evasion ; and on being desired by counsel to
observe that it is an inadmissible evasion, simply re-
peats the evasion, when the question is anew put to
him in a form purposely shaped to exclude it; the
feeling in court is apt to be, that the witness is a little
in a difficulty, and that the question is one to which it
does not suit him to give a plain answer. If we simi-
larly infer in the present case, that Mr Mill, in the
matter of his feeling of Freedom, obstinately refuses
the Yea or Nay desired and indeed implored of him, as
the brief and only competent answer, simply because
such an answer sans phrase would be inconvenient for
him, we shall not be much out in the inference. His
true feeling in the matter incidentally becomes obvious
further on (p. 583), when, in defining the conditions
under which ' exemption ' from moral criminality must
be accorded to acts, under other conditions held crim-
inal, he says—' Yes, if he really " could not help " acting
' as he did — that is, if it did not depend on his will ; if
' he was under physical constraint, or even if he was
' under the action of such a violent motive that no fear

Mr Mill's Evasions accotmted for. 35

' of punislinieiit could have any effect ; ■which, if cap-
' able of being ascertained, is a jnst ground of exemp-
' tion.' Certain of his actions excepted, therefore, on
the ground that he ' could not help ' them, all his other
voluntary actions (the actions which ' depend on his
' Will'), Mr Mill unmistakably implies, it is in the
power of the man to ' help.' Doing so, the man could
yet have helped doing so, and done otherwise. To this
Mr MlU. is here fully committed, not merely as his
practical feeling in the matter, but as positively his
real belief And this of a power in us to help doing
as we do, or do otherwise, is the express definition of
Freedom. Can the proof be more clear and explicit
than it is in the light of this passage — from which, as
now reissued with the stamp of his careful revision
upon it, Mr Mill cannot possibly withdraw — that, as
I pledged myself to show, Mr Mill, even whilst de-
clining to admit in himself Hodge's practical feeling
of Freedom, has it all the same, just as Hodge has ?
The reader, I may hope, sees now with sufficient clear-
ness the raison d'etre of Mr Mill's insuperable reluc-
tance to give us a plain Yes or Wo to a question which
can properly no otherwise be answered. Could he
have been got to do so, to the question — doing so, is it
or not your feeling, you could yet have helped doing so,
or done otherwise ? — he must inevitably have answered,
I could ' have helped it,' I was free to do otherwise —
such is my genuine feeling in the matter. And this
feeling, I may observe en passant, amounts to something
very different from ' the practical feeling of free-will

2,6 Mr Mill a Believer in Freedom.

' common to all mankind,' defined by Mr Mill in the
Logic, as no more than ' a feeling of being able to
' modify our character if ive, luish! i

I don't the least intend, in any of the above remarks,
to impeach Mr Mill's candour, or imply that he con-
sciously shirks a question, as knowing it would be
awkward for him to answer it. But that, in point of
fact, he does shirk a question, which there is evidence
he could not have candidly answered except as his
, opponents would wish him to do, seems simply a thing
proved. For it is not to be supposed that Mr Mill, in
writing, reconsidering, and rewriting ' Yes, if he really
"could not Ae/jj" acting as he did,' &c., was all the
time ignorant of his own meaning, or innocent of mean-
ing at all. Touching the slight alteration in the
passage, made by Mr Mill in revision of it, something
may hereafter be said. (See page 116, et seq.)

^ As to this, ' ' we can modify our character, if we wish" (or loill, as Mr
Mill elsewhei-e puts it), we shall, as we proceed, see what after all it
amounts to (p. 94).

A W of ul Picture.

IV.

Note — ]}age bib.

' Me Alexander draws a woful picture of the pass wliicli
mankind ■would come to, if belief in so-caUed Necessity be-
came general. AU " our current moralities " would come
to be regarded as " a form of superstition ; " all "moral ideas
as illusions," by wliiob " it is plain we get rid of them as
motives ; " and consequently the internal sanctions of con-
science would no longer exist. " The external sanctions
"remain, but not quite as they were. That important
" section of them which rests on the moral approval or dis-
" approval of our feUow-men has of course evaporated ; "
and " in virtue of a deadly moral indifference," the remaining
external sanctions " might come to be more languidly en-
forced than as now they are," and the progressive degra-
dation would in a suflS-cient time " succeed in reproducing
the real original gorilla." A formidable prospect ; but Mr
Alexander must not suppose that other people's feelings about
the matters of the highest importance to them are bound up
with a certaiu speculative dogma, and even a certain form
of words, because, it seems, his are. As long as guUt is
thoroughly regarded as an evil, it would be quite safe even
to hold with Plato that it is the mental equivalent of bodily
disease ; people would be none the less anxious to avoid it
in themselves and to cure it in others. Whatever else may

38 A Wofid Picture.

be an illusion, it is no illusion that some types of conduct
and character are salutary, and others pernicious to the race
and to each of its members ; and there is no fear that man-
kind ■wUl not retain the property of their nature by whieh
they prefer what is salutary to what is pernicious, and pro-
claim and act upon the preference. It is no illusion that
human beings are objects of sympathy or of antipathy as
they belong to the. one type or to the other, and that the
sympathies and antipathies excited in us by others react on
ourselves. The qualities which each man feels to be odious
in others, are odious, without illusion, in himself. The
basis of Mr Alexander's gloomy prophecy thus fails him.'

The passage here criticised by Mr Mill was really no
more than it professed itself ; a mere ' swift confused
outline not worth taking any great pains with ' in the
writing; and for all its bearing on the subject, Mr
Mill needs scarce have been at pains to criticise it.
Further, it was professedly the merest fancy sketch of
' tendencies ' calculated on ' a hypothesis to be regarded
as practically an impossible one.' To criticise it from
the ground of the actual, as Mr Mill here does, is there-
fore plainly illegitimate. ' The hasis of Mr Alexander's
' gloomy prophecy thus fails him ! ' Of a prophecy,
no more than a sportive flight of fancy, and, as such,
announcing itself based on ' a practically impossible
hypothesis,' where is the sense of such a criticism ?
In the very nature of the case, the basis of my pro-
phecy, in Mr Mill's serious sense, fails me ; but as I
built on it only a very slight card-castle, as knowing it
an ' impossible ' basis, and distinctly admitting it such.

Mr Mill's Criticism of it. 39

what becomes of the basis of Mr Mill's elaborate criti-
cism ? As a criticism it has plainly no meaning ; as a
demonstration of the impossibility of an admittedly
'impossible hypothesis,' it seems to have considerable
merit, but might almost be considered superfluous.
Moreover, such as it was, my sketch, in assuming a
world of Necessitarians, assumed them as not only
understanding their own doctrine, but as destitute of
every feeling or impulse not logically to be brought
into harmony with it; not as ISTecessitarians of Mr
Mill's type, who so little understand their own doctrine,
that, believing in Necessity or unconditional Causation,
they don't in the least cease to believe with their op-
ponents who advocate Freedom, that they 'could have
helped ' their every action ; with all the results which
may hold of this. And perhaps it might be shown,
were it worth while, that in regard of the passage in
question, and Mr Mill's deliverance upon it, this dis-
tinction is not one wholly without a difference ; but
clearly it could not be worth while, the very basis of
Mr Mill's deliverance being, as we have seen it, erro-
neous. One or two random remarks may suffice.

That ' it would be quite safe to hold with Plato, that
guilt is the mental equivalent of bodily disease ' (almost
as a matter of course Plato does not hold this ; what
he holds is, that guilt is an analogue of bodily disease,
which is not exactly an eq-wivalent^), I can scarcely
concede to Mr Mill. On this ground, that plainly it

^ His view is in no essential respect different from that set forth by
Butler, in his three introductory Sermons. Ee also maintains that

40 Mr Mill's Criticism of it considered.

■would cease to be considered guilt in the understood
sense of the term. The word culpable would cease to
have a meaning, and we should no more hlame a man
for murdering his mother than for having an attack of
typhus. "We should not the less continue to 'thoroughly
regard his act as an evil ' — imprimis, from the point of
view of sympathy with the poor old lady, probably
foolish enough to love her own life a little ; and
further, as prospectively threatening ourselves, a little
like the old lady enamoured of our own very foolish
lives. But as moral evil, plainly we should not regard
it ; moral as distinct from natural evil, and as ground
of blame or disapproval {moral, of course, for there are
other forms of disapproval), would not any longer be
recognised either in ourselves or others. The internal
sanctions of conscience would clearly in this view be
nowhere. Considering how indifferently we get on
with the internal and external sanctions combined, I
confess I should look upon our safety as more or less
compromised were we left to depend for it solely on
the latter. That 'we should still be anxious' (on
obvious grounds I cannot go quite Mr Mill's length of
' not the less anxious ') ' to avoid it for ourselves,' &c.
&c. &c. In all this Mr Mill, if he supposes he is
fighting any one, is at least not fighting me. Inasmuch
as he here says no more than I had myself said in
writing, that even in default of the moral relations of

Virtue is, in a sense, the health, and Vice the disease, of the mind ;
and in point of fact all moralists, of whatever school, are, I should
say, pretty much agreed as to this.

Mr Mill's Criticism of it considered. 41

actions, ' relations to utility would remain, on which
' ground we might properly encourage the one class
' of persons, and discourage the other by hanging
' them as good riddance, and some hint of a warning
' to a public supposed amenable to motive,' I can
hire of course have no dispute with him. Whatever
we make of morality, pleasure is pleasure, pain, pain ;
and on mere motives of fear and appetite, systemati-
cally worked to that end. Society, in some brutal and
degraded form of it, might still perhaps contrive to
exist. ' I might add, that even if his groundless an-
' ticipations ' (sportively set forth as groundless) ' came
' to pass in some other manner, and disinterested love
' of virtue and hatred of guilt faded away from the
' earth ; though the human race, thus degenerated,
' would be little worth preserving, it would probably
' iind the means of preserving itself notwithstanding.'
Had Mr Mill, in doing me the compliment to read
and reply to me (it is one which, in all seriousness, I
appreciate), done me the further compliment of read-
ing me with a little attention, he could not possibly
have supposed that here he was joining issue with me.
All this I can very well concede to Mr Mill, as having
myself implied it, as we saw, in the work he is criticis-
ing ; and in one further remark which he makes in
relation to this topic, I frankly admit myself corrected.
' The external sanctions, instead of being more lan-
' guidly, would probably be far more rigorously enforced
' than at present ; far more rigorous penalties would be
' necessary, when there was less inward sentiment to

42 His Criticism at one Point Successful.

' aid them ; and however destitute of pure virtuous
' feeling mankind might be, each of them would be far
' too well aware of the importance of other people's
' conduct to his own interest, not to exact those
' penalties without stint, and without any of the
' scruples which at present make conscientious men
' afraid of carrying repression too far.' It gives me
pleasure to be so criticised. Could a sic omnia have
been written over Mr Mill's remarks throughout, my
pleasure might perhaps have been marred more or less,
and any little gaudia certaminis I might have promised
myself in running a tilt with Mr Mill must needs have
come much to grief. What I said as to the ' external
sanctions' being likely, on the disappearance of the
' internal' ones, to be 'more languidly' enforced, was,
I believe, from my own point of view, correct enough,
in as far as that there would be such a tendency; but I
omitted to take into account the j^sr contra suggested
by Mr Mill, which is really, I think, of clearly prepon-
derating importance. I admit that my ' woful picture '
was, even as a fancy picture to this extent, plainly
a faulty one. Mr Mill is not quite the philosophical
good girl of a Fairy Tale very many of his admirers
have supposed him. All his words are not necessarily
pearls and rubies ; but he cannot speak, even in Parlia-
ment, without dropping an occasional jewel, which
might almost seem out of place there as distracting to
nine in ten of the senators ; and on no subject could
he possibly write, at some point of which he would not
sparkle, as here.

Mr Mill involved in Contradictories. 43

Fundamentally flawed, as we have seen it, this pas-
sage of Mr Mill has had somewhat more of my attention
than it ' deserves,' or will quite ' repay.' ISTot the less
on one significant clause of it I must further proceed
to remark : ' A formidable prospect ! But Mr Alex-
• ander must not suppose that other people's feelings
' about the matters of the highest importance to them,
' are bound up with a certain speculative dogma, and
' even a certain form of words, because, it seems, his are.'
Truth is one, as I understand the matter ; and if my
' speculative dogma' conflicts with my ' practical feeling'
on a matter of whatever importance to me, I must sacri-
fice the one or the other, considered as a guarantee of
truth. If I hold to my 'speculative dogma,' I cannot
speculativdy regard the 'practical feeling' which conflicts
with it as aught but, so to phrase it, a document of illu-
sion. Mr Mill is, it seems, not embarrassed with any
considerations of this kind. As speculative dogma, he
asserts unconditional Causation as exclusive of human
Freedom. He asserts, that is — if in the least he knows
his own meaning — that no man can in anything liel-p
doing as he does. On the other hand, on what can
only be the ground of practical feeling, we have just
seen him assert — or im'ply, with a clearness equivalent
to assertion — that every man — certain specified cases
excepted — can help doing as he does ; which amounts
to an assertion — if again we suppose Mr Mill to know
his own meaning — of Freedom. These are contradic-
tory propositions, yet to both of them Mr Mill is clearly
committed. From which of them is it, that on finding

44 Mr Mill's way out of the Difficulty.

the incongruity pressed upon him, Mr Mill would
elect to retire 1 From the last it would be of course —
to wit, that we can lulp our actions. And now, if we
cannot help our actions, on what ground does Mr Mill
continue to maintain that we are yet morally respon-
sible for them ? There is no ground on which he can
do so ; for we have it under his own hand — ' Yes, if he
really " could not help " acting as he did,' the man is
not morally criminal, aja.A justly the subject of punish-
ment. Mr Mill's ' speculative dogma ' is thus dis-
tinctly, on his own showing, seen to ground a direct
negation of the moral accountability of man. That Mr
MUl should think it competent for him at this point
to reclaim, — ' Oh ! my feelings on matters of such high
' importance to me^ — my moral feelings — are not bound
' up, whatever yours may be, with any speculative
' dogma,' is simply a matter to be marvelled over. The
sole question in dispute is, as to whether these feelings,
the existence and supreme importance of which are
not by any one denied, can, divorced from all power in
us to help our actions, be shown to have a rational basis
— it is a purely speculative question. That here, as
elsewhere,^ Mr Mill should think it of importance to

1 ' That a person holding what is called the Necessitarian doctrine
' should on that account feel that it would he unjust to punish him
' for his wrong actions, seems to me the veriest of chimeras.' — Mill
on Samilion.

That Mr Mill's ' feelings about the matters of highest importance to
him ' are his feelings as to ' moral distinctions, ' no one can possibly
question, the sentence in the text being looked to, apropos of which
his Note is introduced.

See further on this point as follows, p. 112-113.

Seems to be rather an tmhappy one. 45 ,

allege, in regard of it, tM existence of the feelings them-
selves, thus announcing an obstinate practical convic-
tion or instinct as of weight against the opposed specu-
lative conclusion, is really as gross a blunder as Dr
Johnson's rough and ready refutation of Berkeley by
kicking a stone with his foot, by Mr Mill himself else-
where with scorn commented on. It is, in point of
fact, precisely the same blunder transferred to the
spiritual plane of thought. Mr Mill's scorn, like the
curses of the Eastern proverb, had better ' go home to
roost.'

46 The Ethical Doctrine of Ptinishment.

V.

Note — ipage 579.

'How far Mr Alexander understands the first elements
of the ethical theory he denounces, is shown by one of his
arguments, which he is so fond of that he repeats it several
times, that if the protection of society is a sufficient reason
for hanging any one, it holds good for hanging an innocent
person or a madman (p. 56, 57, 65, 89). He repeatedly
says that this has just as deterring an effect as hanging a
real criminal ; being of opinion, apparently, that hanging a
person who is not guilty gives people a motive to abstain
from being guilty. As to the madman, he asks (p. 65) —
" How should the state of mind of the maniac, as unamen-
" able to motive, any way affect the'^fficacy of our hanging
" him for murder, as a means to deter others from murder % "
Mr Alexander really has no claim to be answered tUl he
has got a step or two beyond this. Perhaps, however, he
may be able to see, that all the deterring effect which hang-
ing can produce on men who are amenable to motive, is
produced by hanging men who are amenable to motive.
Hanging, in addition, those who are not amenable to motive,
adds nothing to the deterring effect, and is therefore a gra-
tuitous brutality.'

Punishment. 4 7

In saying, in a sort of sub-sarcastic way, that I am
so fond of an argument tliat I repeat it several times,
the several pages being specified, Mr Mill is plainly of
opinion he triumphantly refutes my argument. But
surely in this there seems to be some logical fallacy,
unworthy of so strict an intelligence. It is just pos-
sible I may have been fond of my argument, as finding
it really a good one ; precisely on which ground, Mr
MUl, as at first sight disliking it (p. 56), might nat-
urally be much disgusted to meet with it again and
again (p. 57, 65, 89). It is precisely poor Jack's
complaint against the boatswain who scores his back
for him, that, having given him a cut with the cat, he
proceeds to ' repeat it several times,' to the extent of
two dozen or more, perhaps. That Mr Mill, though
escaping more easHy, has Jack Tar's reason to dislike
my pestilent argument, and resent, as he does, the re-
petition of it, will presently perhaps appear, from his
very small success in replying to it.

That I can anywhere be said to have denounced
Mr MiLL's Utilitarianism — further than as saying in
effect, that at times it lay open to the suspicion of
quietly assuming the ultimate moral basis, its need of
which is by implication denied — is simply not to be
alleged. For Mr Mill's Utilitarianism, as an ' ethical
system,' I have really nothing but respect. His book
on the subject, with the trifling limitation suggested,
is an admirable little treatise, in its kind to be held a
model. In holding that inductions of utility determine
what shall be consecrated as right, and what censured

48 Mr Mill's Utilitarianism.

as wrong, I should be disposed to go nearly all lengths
with Mr Mill; and as to the 'Immutable Morality'
business, I regard it pretty much as a sort of reverend
old Mummy, which it is necessary to unswathe from
time to time, in the interest of Historical Science, but
which is now as defunct as Pharaoh. In fact it was, I
rather think, Mr MiU himself who conclusively slew
the good old doting creature. Did ever any one seri-
ously try to defend, as against his assault, the position
of Messrs Whewell and Sedgwick ? I do not in the
least know; but should rather suppose not. Going
along with Mr Mill so considerable a way as this, I
only venture to part company with him in questioning,
whether the primary moral conception or idea of right
and wrong, under which, as right and wrong, the va-
rious things held right and wrong come thus to group
themselves in contrast — and without which, as already
existing in the mind, it seems plain that rightness and
wrongness could of nothing whatever be predicated —
can be come at by any manipulation of considerations
merely utilitarian. This question — in which I do not
profess to see my way with anything like perfect clear-
ness, having only in the most cursory way considered
of it — I happily need not here meddle with, as confes-
sing myself much at a loss in regard of the matter in
hand, to discern its relation to Mr Mill's ' ethical sys-
tem,' and my assumed inability to understand it. It
would be pity indeed for Mr Mill's ethical theories,
which include so much that is valuable, if they had to

Mr Mill's happiness in Quotation. 49

stand or fall with the reasonings wherewith he seems
here disposed to identify them. It is presented as ' Mr
' Alexander's opinion that if the protection of society
' is a sufficient reason for hanging any one, it holds
' good for hanging an innocent person or a madman.
' He repeatedly says that this has just as deterring an
' effect as hanging a real criminal; heing of opinion,
' apparently, that hanging a person who is not guilty
' gives people a motive to abstain from heing guilty.'
What I wrote was — hanging a person who is not
guilty, ' the puhlic presumed ignorant of the little deceit
' practised upon it;'^ in which case, it may be hoped
nothing in Mr Mill's ' ethical system ' precludes him
from clearly seeing that the effect upon the public
would be precisely the same as if the real criminal had
suffered. This clause I inserted for Mr MlLI's special
behoof, as remembering his criticism of M. Cousin on
this very point (vide Logic, vol. ii. chap. " Fallacies of
Observation ") ; ^ but it seems I might have spared my-
self the trouble, Mr Mill being pleased, as we see, to

' Mill and Carlyle, p. 56 — the only passage which, to this subject
has reference.

^ Mr Mill's reasoning, as against M. Cousin, seems not quite so
conclusive as might be wished ; inasmuch as in correcting what he
calls a 'fallacy of overlooking,' he himself proceeds to commit one.
He a little overlooks the fact, that it could never be as innocent, but
solely as guilty — though indeed erroneously supposed so — that an
innocent man could be punished. As, however, Mr Mill could not
fail to he entirely pleased with his own argument, I deemed it as well
to evade it by inserting the clause as above — with such result as we
see.

D

50 Happiness in Quotation.

ignore it. Perhaps, now that his attention is called to
it, he ' may be able to see ' that the light insinuation of
scorn in his ' being of opinion apparently ' had, after
all, as regards 'the innocent person,' and that other
innocent person, myself, no very particular point in it.
Such point as it really has, seems rather to threaten Mr
Mill himself, than to look for me deadly. Were I in
the least disposed — as emphatically I say I am not —
to ' insinuate bad faith ' in Mr Mill, might I not liere,
do something more than ' insinuate ' that Mr Mill's
reading public has more or less reason to complain of
' a little deceit practised upon it ' ? But distinctly
nothing of the kind would I permit myself to say or
insinuate. All that I venture to say is — that it is a
pity Mr Mill should either not have read this clause,
or have forgotten it in writing his criticism.

With ' the madman ' it does not seem to me that Mr
Mill succeeds greatly better than we have seen him do
with ' the innocent person.' Let us look a little at his
dealings with him. ' As to the madman, Mr Alexander
' asks — " How should the state of mind of the maniac,
' " as unamenable to motive, any way affect the efficacy
' " of our hanging him for murder, as a means to deter
' " others from murder ? " Mr Alexander has really no
' claim to be answered, until he has got a step or two
' beyond this. Perhaps, however, he may be able to
' see that all the deterring effect which hanging can
' produce on men who are amenable to motive, is pro-
' duced by hanging men who are amenable to motive.'

Mr Mill a too Advanced Thinker. 5 1

I shall never be able to see this ; Mr Mill, at this
point, among othfers, is somewhat too 'advanced' a
thinker for me ; and he must come ' a step or two '
back, before agreement between us is possible. As
regards ' deterring effect/ it will be evident, I believe,
to every one who has not some argument or ' ethical
system,' in the interest of which to deny it, that the
hanging of a maniac for murder would be equally
efficacious with that of a sane man ; as not any whit
less suggestive of the grim tu quoque, for Bill Sykes
and his compeers, the soul of the deterrent influence.
As to madness in its proper nature, amenability to
motive, or unamenability, what know these thousands
of unwashed blockheads, for whose moral edification
such amiable spectacles are exhibited ? ^ Absolutely
no more than if they were all medical experts ! What
they do with sufficient sharpness know, however, is
that the man has committed murder, and that before
their very eyes he is being hanged for it. Strange,
indeed, if this does not serve as a pretty impressive
reminder of the further saving knowledge, otherwise
vaguely conveyed to them, that if they also commit
murder, they will also surely be hanged for it. What
was previously an abstract proposition seems here
translated into the concrete for them, in terms of
rather formidable emphasis. And will Mr Mill, with
full deliberation, assert that complete sanity in the

' They hare now ceased to Ije exliibited ; the more, as I think, the
pity.

5 2 Mania and Punishment.

sufferer is essential in order that this should be the
case ; that the least little dash of insanity in him
would suffice utterly to preclude- the associations
which would otherwise be formed in the mind be- ■
tween the one fact of murder, and the other fact of
being hanged for it 1 Can it possiblj' be any part of
Mr Mill's 'Association Philosophy' to assert such a
thing as this? So far is Mr Mill's notion of non-
effectiveness in the hanging of a madman from being
the self-evident axiom he assumes it, that the very
reverse might with some plausibility be argued. In
as far as the fact of the madness was at all considered,
it could not but suggest, even to these not very bright
minds, more or less of mitigation in the offence ;
their natural sense would be sure to be, that, though
indeed he had murdered his wife — who possibly de-
served no less — the poor devil was being rather hardly
used for it ; and the inference, as obvious, would be
nearly sure to occur, that if such is the rigour of the
law, that, with the plea of madness in his favour, he,
is not allowed to escape, by so much the less, in the
like case, will tliey be allowed to escape, for whom no
such plea is to be offered. Prom this point of view
it might even be urged, that as regards deterring
effect, there is an element of impressiveness in the
hanging of a maniac, not present in that of the sane
man. Supposing a strong feeling in the spectators,
that on the ground of insanity or another ground,
the criminal ought riot to be hanged; would it be

Mania and Punishment. 5 3

their sure or probable inference from the fact that,
right or wrong, he was hanged, that they in the like
case, would not he ? Either Mr MiU supposes this,
or he does not. If he does suppose it, he will not get
any one to agree with him. If he does not suppose
it, what has become of his argument ?

In any case, it will scarcely, I should think, be
pretended by Mr Mill, that our sole reason for not
hanging maniacs, as we do sane men, is our scepticism
as to whether our doing so, — as in the other case we
assume, — would have tendency to deter others from
the crime on the scaffold expiated. Yet this would
be needed for his argument. In the sentence by Mr
Mill cited, I was combating his dictum that 'the
' justice of punishment has nothing to do with the
' state of mind of the offender ; furtlier than as this
' may affect the efficacy of punishment as a means to its
' end.' In answer to this it was that I instanced the
case of the maniac, whose ' state of mind ' we do most
carefully take account of, on a ground, as I ventured,
and still venture, to surmise, of mere justice to the
wretch not morally to be held criminal ; and I said
that as to the other ground of ' protection to society,'
he would, equally well with a saner man, exemplify
the terrors of the law. Mr Mill, in denying this, is
also bound to deny that there is any othei- ground
of our minute and extreme scrupulosity as to the
sanity of capital criminals, than a doubt as to whether
the hanging of the insane would have any deterring

54 Mania and Punishment.

efficacy. Mr Mill is perhaps capable of denying this,
as he finds it essential to his argument, but scarcely,
I should really hope, otherwise.^

' As to the sole other assignable ground— not in the above alluded
to — on which the execution of a maniac might be held to have some
tendency to defeat its object, as enlisting the sympathies of the public
against the law and in favour of its victim, not thus annulling, in-
deed, yet possibly in some degree disturbing, the salutary associations
between crime and its punishment — it was not here necessary to
allude to it ; inasmuch as Mr Mill is plainly here debarred from as-
signing it, the supposed public feeling in the matter being excited by
nothing intelligible, save a sense of the brute injustice of hanging a
man ' the state of whose mind ' fatally determined him to crime.

Fanaticism and Punishment. 5 5

VI.

Note— ^sa^re 580.

' The force of this argument^ is attested by the straits to
whicli my most persevering antagonist, Mr Alexander, is
reduced by it.'

In reply to Mr Mill's argument here, I was cer-
tainly not conscioths, at least, of being reduced to any
particular strait; in truth, no passage in his whole
Chapter seemed to me to admit of so easy and con-
clusive a confutation as this which he so much relies
on. Let us see whether Mr Mill, in his rejoinder, be
not himself reduced to some little strait of dif&culty.

' Mr Alexander finds himself obliged to say, that " could
we have positive assurance " in the case of such people, " that
" their outrage of the obligation to respect life was solely an act
" of self-sacrifice to what they considered a higher and more

^ ' I ask any one who thinks that the justice of punishment is not
' suflBciently vindicated hy its being for the protection of just rights,
' how he reconciles his sense of justice to the punishment of crimes .
' committed in obedience to a perverted conscience ? Ravaillac and
' Balthasar Gerard did not regard themselves as criminals, but as
' heroic martyrs. If they were justly put to death, the justice of
' punishment has nothing to do with the state of mind of the offender,

56 Fanaticism and Pimishment.

" sacred one," we should be obliged to admit that tbeir doom
" was not just in tbe particular instance.'' This is very well,
but we want practice as well as theory. Would you hang
them % Mr Alexander makes a halting half-admission that he
would. " A dubious point of justice — dubious because the
" true motiveof the act must always remain obscure — may here
" be allowed to be over-ridden by a plain and potent man-
" date of expediency." Mr Alexander, therefore, would hang
men, when it is doubtful whether they deserve it, would
hang them for what " may really have been an act of sub-
lime virtue." But what is the amount of real dubiousness
in cases like these ? Of all acts which a man can do, those
by which he knowingly sacrifices his own life, sometimes
with the addition of horrible torments, are the clearest
from suspicion of aU motives but honest ones. Mr Alex-
ander talks of Brutus and Charlotte Corday ; but I am con-
tent with Eavaillac. Is there the smallest reason to doubt
that Eavaillac's " outrage of the obligation to respect life "
was an " act of self-sacrifice," to what in his opinion was
" a higher and more sacred one"? What motive had Ea-
vaiUac for his abominable action except a supposed duty to
God, and did he not deem this his highest and most sacred
duty ? As for Mr Alexander's hint that such a man, if not
culpable in the act, was " culpable in the perversion of his
conscience which led to it," it is the old odious assumption
of persecutors, that acts which they cannot show to have

' farther than this may affect the efficacy of punishment as a means
' to its end. It is impossible to assert the justice of punishment for
' crimes of fanaticism, on any other ground than its necessity for the
' attainment of a just end. If that is not a justification, there is no
' justification. All our imaginary justifications break down in their
' application to this case.' — Mill on Hamilton, p. 580.

Mr Mill again happy in Quotation. 5 7

been wicked in intention, must have originated in previous
wickedness. The act of Eavaillac simply originated in false
teaching, coming to him from the same quarter from which
had come most of the good teaching which he had received
through life. It came from the fountain of goodness, not of
wickedness.'

It would in all cases be well that citations in in-
verted commas should be quite punctilious in accur-
acy, not only verbally, as given, but as giving the
whole meaning of the author. Having said that, in
the case of such heroic sinners for conscience' sake,
without considering the doom awarded them just ' as
* deserved, or due to their deed, considered in itself, and
' as an isolated act,' we should yet ' on obvious grounds
of general expediency acquiesce in it,' I further said —
'justifiable, we should call it in the general, not just
' in the particular instance ;' and I proceeded to assign
as the ground on which we should hold it justifiable,
that ' such whimsical heroes were inconvenient, inas-
' much as no society could afford to grow a succession of
' them.' Had not Mr Mill, in quoting the clause, ' not
'just in the particular instance,' seen fit to suppress the
'justifiable in the general ' which precedes it, with the
previous statement of ' acquiescence,' he could scarce
have represented as a 'halting half-admission' what
is really as frank and explicit as it seems possible for
words to make it ; or desiderated ' practice as well as
theory,' seeing he already had both. 'Would you
hang them?' Certainly — I had already indicated.

58 In Mr Mill a certain Obtuseness.

on clear social grounds stated, which I shoidd have
thought to Mr Mill particularly pleasing and satis-
factory. 'Would hang them for what may reaUy
have been an act of sublime virtue?' Certainly —
again I answer ; as before I had plainly implied. I
would not balk the sublime virtue by defrauding it
of its dues expected. Mr Mill a little seems to forget
that solely by reason of its exercise under a positive
certainty — or at least extreme risk — of being hanged
for it, is the virtue at all a sublime one. I would
permit it to be as sublime as Mr Calcraft could possi-
bly make it.

Again — 'But what is the amount of real dubious-
' ness,' &c. &c. &c. ? I should not have thought it
possible that Mr Mill could so miss, as he has here
done, the point of an opponent's argument. There is
not, so far as we Ttnow, the smallest ' reason to doubt
' that Ravaillac's act was one, as it professed to be, of
'supposed duty to God.' But let us suppose a case.
Suppose Eavaillac to have had a pretty wife, or —
seeing he was a priest — let me rather say, a pretty
mistress (it may be hoped that, in a Protestant
country, this suggestion will be well received, as
certifying the piety of the writer), and suppose the
gallant Henry to have got his eye upon her. There
seems not 'the smallest reason to doubt,' he would
forthwith have proceeded to seduce her. Eavaillac
would then have had a deadly private wrong to
avenge; and, as to allege what Mr Mill would caU
the ' honest motive ' would needs have involved some

In Mr Mill a certain Obtuseness. 59

compromise of professional character, he might very-
well have seen fit, on a point of esprit de corps, to
compass his end under the mask of a public religious
duty. Can Mr Mill fail to see that such cases might
frequently occur ; and that to accord immunity to
acts of violence which could allege for themselves
some lofty motive of conscience, would be simply to
insure their frequency, and sap the very basis of
society? Sheltered under the zeal for God, which
would no doubt be loud upon their lips, men might
without scruple proceed upon the devil's work, in the
venting of their basest malignity. Hackston of
Eathillet is a historical instance somewhat in point,
who, having, on his own account, a quarrel with
Archbishop Sharpe, when the old man was under the
daggers, stood apart with his cloak devoutly drawn
over his lips, lest the justice of the Lord being exe-
cuted should take taint of his personal bitterness.
But all men are not so scrupulous as the pious Hack-
ston; on which ground — were there no other — it
would be plainly preposterous, as merely a premium
on crime, to make exception in favour of criminals
for conscience' sake, so called. Such was my meaning
when I spoke of ' a dubious point of justice — dubious,
' because the true motive of the act must always remain
'obscure;' and I should not have thought it could
possibly need explanation, had it not been so totally
missed by Mr Mill, in his ' clearest from suspicion of
all motives but honest ones.' So totally has he missed
my meaning here, that it is pretty plainly from my

6o Ml'- Mill ' Content with Ravaillac!

speaking of ' a dubious point of justice,' that he has in-
ferred in my mind dubiety as to whether I -would hang
such culprits, and out of what was clear and explicit,
has coined for me his ' halting half-admission.' If he
will once more glance at the passage, Mr Mill will see
that the point of dubiety spoken of was one which
suggests not the hanging of the culprit, but the sparing
him ; and probably not even in the interest of an argu-
ment or a pet theory, is Mr Mill prepared to maintain
that to hang a man and to spare him are identical, or
even reconcilable, propositions.

Again — ' Mr Alexander talks of Brutus and Char-
' lotte Corday ; but I am content with Eavaillac' I
also, for that matter, am content with Eavaillac ; pro-
bably a heroic conscientious kind of creature, whom
one regrets it should have been at once necessary and
proper to extirpate ; but on whom — as no doubt dying
under the usual consoling convictions of the martyr,
that in having his bowels plucked out and exhibited
to him, he was becoming ' the seed of the Church,' and
securing for his persecutors a very evil future indeed —
it is not necessary to waste compassion. But really,
what does this turn of Mr Mill's amount to ? I am
content with my own instances, and decline to consider
those adduced in reply by my opponent ! When I
asked — ' Was Charlotte Corday justly put to death, in
' the sense that she deserved her doom ? ' if Mr Mill
condescended at all to take notice of me, he was surely
bound to give me an answer. Provisionally, I had
ventured to answer for him pretty confidently — ' Mr

' Coitte7it ivith Ravaillac' 6i

' Mill ivill not say so.' If Mr Mill could have repudi-
ated the moral judgment thus attributed to him, is it
not obvious he would have done so, seeing that if he
cannot repudiate it he must admit his whole argument
coUapsed ? Not being able to repudiate it — as I ven-
ture to surmise he was not — it was no doubt natural
enough for him to say — Charlotte Corday ! hum ! ha !
hum ! I quite decline to consider her ; if you please,
' I am content with Eavaillac ; ' but readers will per-
haps agree with me in thinking this not a very cogent
line of argument. Which of us seems the more ' re-
duced to straits ' here, I leave it to others to determine.^

^ Of all such cases as those here considered, Eavaillac, Balthasar
Geraxd, Brutus, Charlotte Corday, Orsini, id genus omne — what is to
be said is that under the legal enactment the punishment of the crime
is justified, the very existence of society being imperilled were such
actions to be left unpunished. As to the actual criminality of the
acts from the point of view of the operator, and the justice of the
punishment, as deserved, there is positively nothing to be said with
even a pretence to scientific accuracy. According to the theory we
may form of his motives, Brutus was either the sublimest of patriots,
or the most degraded of scoundrels (one's own easy notion is, that he
was almost certainly a little of ioth). So of Charlotte Corday ! a
touching and heroic creature doubtless — with the sincerest detestation
of Marat, and perhaps a little French rage for notoriety. How much
of this last there may have been, would Mr Carlyle undertake to in-
form us ? In brief, each of such cases must be separately adjudicated
on by the morahst ; and there is room for endless diversity of opinion
as to whether the punishment might be just, in the sense of its being
deserved. But that in every such case it is justifiable from the point
of view of the legalist, and on larger social considerations, no one
will be found to deny. Mr Mill's whole argument here proceeds on
an identification of the legally and socially jasiJ^ffiiZe with the morally
just or deserved : than which no two notions can be more distinctly
discriminated. And throughout this whole section of his argument
the same thing is to be noted. Should he wish, in the next edition

62 ' Reduced to Straits'

Turther, it was — as before noted — in answer to Mr
Mill's dictum in tliis passage, that ' the justice of punish-
' ment has nothing to do with the state of mind of the
' ofifeuder,' &c.,that I instanced the case of the maniac,
whose ' state of mind ' we do most carefully take ac-
count of. Mr Mill, in reply, is forced, as we have
seen, to maintain that, by the punishment under the
law, of a manaic for murder, sane men would not in
the least impressively be reminded that all men, sane
or insane, will be punished if they commit murder ;
that murder will inevitably by law he punished. It
seems to me, in the light of what I have already said
as to this, that the person maintaining so hopeless a
proposition in order to defend his argument, is ' re-
duced ' to rather desperate ' straits ' in defending it.

One word as to another little point, though perhaps
as merely personal, and no way of affecting the argu-
ment, it not very much deserves attention. 'As for
' Mr Alexander's hint that such a man, if not culpable
' in the act, was " culpable in the perversion of his con-
' science that led to it," it is the old odious assump-

of his Logic, to further illustrate the ' Fallacy of Confusion, ' which
arises in the abuse of paronymous words, he could not do better than
refer to this chapter of his own. It is a positive min^ of such in-
stances.

[As it seems not quite fail- to throw out such a charge as that con-
tained in the last sentence without some attempt at least to substan-
tiate it, I quote from my previous essay a passage of some length,
which seems pretty well to bear me out. It may also a very little
serve to buttress and complete a discussion which, arising on isolated
points, almost of necessity became more fragmentary than might be
wished. — Ficie Appendix, Note II.]

Explanation. 63

' tion of persecutors, that acts which they cannot show
' to have been wicked in intention, must have origi-
' nated in previous wickedness.'

Mr Mill uses somewhat strong language here, and
though it does not the least irk me, who am much of
Benedick's mind as to such ' paper bullets of the brain,'
yet as the imputation conveyed is precisely of the sort
under which I should be least willing to lie, a word or
two of explanation may not be amiss. When we speak
of ' a perverted conscience,' we may mean, with Mr
Mill here, a mis-educated conscience, the lapse of which
' originates in false teaching ; ' or we may mean a con-
science se^f-perverted in the persistence of the evil
will. This last it is, I think, which the phrase of itself
most readily suggests. Of this I was thinking when I
penned the clause to Mr Mill so odious ; and Mr Mill
will probably admit that, taken in this connection, it
loses some little of its offensiveness. That thus inter-
preted, what I wrote — except in as far as we suppose that
intervolution of the two modes of perversion, which is
not an unfrequent phenomenon — has any clear per-
tinence to the cases which Mr Mill instantly pro-
ceeded to adduce, I do not of course assert. Mr Mill,
without discrimination, having spoken of ' a perverted
conscience,' I caught at the notion of perversion as it
occurred to me, and did not stay to inquire curiously
whether Mr Mill's instances of Eavaillac, and the like,
fell precisely under that notion ; neither, for anything
it mattered in the argument, was it the least necessary
I should. From defect of precise definition on either

64 Explanation.

side, Mr Mill and I have here been firing across one
another. It is my hope that, on withdrawing my ob-
noxious clause as simply irrelevant to the discussion, I
may cease, in the eyes of Mr Mill, to be the odious
persecuting ruffian I should not wish him to continue
to suppose me.

Causation by Motive. 65

VII.

Note — ^age 582.

\Orlginal Note. — 'Several of Sir W. Hamilton's admis-
sions are strong arguments against the alleged self-evident
connection between free-will and accountability. We have
found him affirming that a volition not determined by mo-
tives " would, if conceived, be conceived as morally worth-
less ;'' that " the free acts of an indifferent, are morally and
"rationally as worthless as the preordained passions of a
"determined wUl;'' and that "it is impossible to see how
" a cause, undetermined by any motive, can be a rational,
" moral, and accountable cause.'' If aU this be so, there
can be no intuitive perception of a necessary connection
between free-will and morality ; it would appear, on the
contrary, that we are naturally unable to recognise an act as
moral, if it is, in the sense of the theory, free.']

[Third Edition. — ' Mr Alexander (p. 80) actually thinks
that in these passages Sir W. Hamilton is " asserting the
determination of the wiU by motives;" and cannot believe
that he intended " to assert an absolute commencement as
" the mode under which freedom, though inconceivable,
"has yet to be believed;" since this "would have been to
" rush with his eyes open on the staring contradictory of a
E

66 Causation by Motive.

" thing at once caused and uncaused." Yet presently after
he himself charges Sir W. Hamilton's doctrine with requir-
ing belief in two contrary inconceivables. In the present
case, it only requires a belief in one of them, an absolute or
uncaused commencement. Mr Alexander does not lay
claim to much knowledge of Sir W. Hamilton ; and cer-
tainly no one who understood what that philosopher, and
most others who discuss this question, mean by " to deter-
mine " could fail to see that with him the determination of
the will by motives means Determinism, or, as it is com-
monly called. Necessity.']

My knowledge of Hamilton's philosophy is, I con-
fess, of the slightest ; but before venturing to write
on this subject, I took care to read, with what seemed
to me sufficient attention, that very small portion of
his writings in which it is expressly treated of ; and I
do ' actually think,' — strange as it may seem to Mr
Mill, — that he does not, in asserting Freedom, intend to
deny motives, or hold, as Mr Mill throughout makes
him do, that ' volitions are emancipated from causa-
tion altogether ' (Note, p. 554). From confusion and
embarrassment, it is impossible, I fear, to relieve Ham-
ilton's desultory Notes on this subject ; but there is
no difficulty whatever in fixing the doctrine at which
he aims — which is one of ' conciliation,' involving be-
lief in Freedom on the one hand, in Determinism, or
Necessity! ^^ ^j-^g Q^her. (What else, than ' Determin-

'■ Can it be needful formally to explain, that by the word Necessity,
as here used, no more is meant than Causation ? Nobody is stupid
enough to suggest belief at once in Freedom, and in Necessity defined

Hamilton's Doctrine. 67

ism' Mr Mill can imagine I suppose Hamilton to
mean by ' the determination of tlie will by motives/ T
need not stay to inquire ; Mr Mill certainly pays me
no compliment in thinking that I 'fail to see' that
determination means determination.)

At page 555 of Mr Mill's book, we find him writing
— ' The inconceivability of the Free-will doctrine is
'maintaiaed by our author (Hamilton), not only on
'the general ground just stated (of its involving an
' absolute commencement), but on the further and
' special ground that the will is determined hy motives.'
After this, it seems almost a little inconsistent in Mr
Mill to represent Hamilton as denying motives. Not
to iasist on this — elsewhere, we find Hamilton writing
— ' Voluntary conation is a faculty which can only be
' determined to energy through a pain or a pleasure —
' through an estimate of the relative worth of objects.' ^
Through a pain or a pleasure; that is, by 'a desire
or aversion,' Mr Mill's own definition of 'a motive.'
Could Hamilton, had he desired, even with emphasis,
to do it, have proclaimed more clearly than as here
he does, ' the determination of the will by motives ' ?
Mr Mill himself ' actually ' quotes this — ' So difficult
' is it to escape from this fact ' (the suggestion of Neces-

as excluding it. These are contradictories. Freedom and Causation
are admitted contraries, or irreconcilable opposites ; they have never yet,
ttat I know of, been shown to be contradictory. — ( Vide p. 137 et seq.)
■"Elsewhere: "Thus conation is not the feeling of pleasure and
pain, but the power of overt activity zoMch pain mid pleasure set in
motion " (as motives). It would be easy, but absurd, to multiply
instances.

68 Hamilton's Doctrme.

sity from 'our collective experience of life') 'that Sir
' W. Hamilton himself says ' — as above. Let any one
turn to the passage (Lectures, i. 188), and he will see
that Hamilton is not wishing to escape from anything,
but stating, with entire simplicity, a fact which it will
presently appear he could not possibly intend to deny.
Elsewhere, again, we find him writing — ' Were we even
' to admit as true what we cannot think as possible, still
' the doctrine of a motiveless volition would be only cas-
' ualism ; and the free acts of an indifferent, are morally
' and rationally as worthless as the preordained pas-
' sions of a determined wiU.' Does Mr MiU really
suppose that Hamilton, in asserting Freedom, as an
implication of man's moral nature, meant to announce
the very doctrine, by himself thus expressly denounced,
as ' only casualism,' and as such, contradictory of that
moral nature, not less than the preordination of
Necessity itself ? ' Motiveless volitions ' are here by
Hamilton provisionally assumed, only to be set aside as
nugatory. Is it reasonable, then, to suppose them in-
cluded in his positive ,doctrine ? That in point of fact
they were iiot so, by intention at least, admits of the
clearest proof.

Hamilton, in the 'Appendix' to his Discussions,
furnishes us, on the subject of Causality (and Freedom),
with some ' hints of an undeveloped Philosophy, which
he is confident is founded on truth.' And this confi-
dence he in great part attributes to his ' finding in this
' system a centre and conciliation for the most opposite
< of philosophical opinions.' "What does Mr Mill sup-

One of Conciliation. 69

pose the ' opposite philosophical opinions ' which Ham-
ilton's doctrine, as it lives in his own mind, ' conciliates' ?
If the opposite opinions conciliated be not, on the one
hand, Freedom as excluding Causation, on the other.
Causation as involving a denial of Freedom, what, in
MlU's notion, are the opinions which Hamilton intends
to conciliate ? Mr Mill's philosophical ingenuity is
admitted great ; but, unless it is greater than I take it
to be, it will scarce avail him for an answer to this
q^uestion. Further, we find Hamilton remarking —
' This scheme proves, moreover, that no difficulty
' emerges in Theology which had not previously
' emerged in Philosophy ; ' and instantly afterwards —
' Specially, in its doctrine of Causality, this philosophy
' brings us back from the aberrations of modern theo-
' logy to the truth and simplicity of the ancient Church.
' It is here shown to be as irrational as irreligious, on
' the ground of human understanding, to deny either,
' on the one hand, the foreknowledge, predestination,
' and free grace of God, as, on the other, the free-wUl of
' man ; that we should believe both, and both in unison,
' though unable to comprehend either, even apart.'
And ' this conciliation/ he immediately after says, ' is
' of the things to be believed, not understood ; ' while
further on we find him speak of ' the total inability of
' man to conceive the union of what he should believe
' united.' In the light of all this, the essential doctrine
of Hamilton is not for one instant to be mistaken.
' No difficulty,' he says, " emerges in Theology, which
' had not previously emerged in Philosophy.' The

yo One of Conciliation.

difficulty involved in God's predestination and fore-
knowledge, as related to human Freedom, he regards as
identical with that involved in Causation, in the same
inscrutable relation. The two difficulties are, in his
view of them, properly forms of the same difficulty.
Now, the theological difficulty he adjusts by announc-
ing of the two seeming irreconcilables, that we should
believe loth, and both in unison.' And the philosophi-
cal difficulty which he regards as the same, he cannot
have meant to resolve differently ! Consequently — and
this becomes additionally clear in the light of the sub-
sequent quotation from his favourite Jacobi — ' The
' union of physical Necessity and moral Freedom, in one
' and the same being, is an absolutely incomprehensible
' fact ; a miracle and mystery like to the creation ' — it
is not for an instant to be doubted, that the result in
which Hamilton's mind rested was this — that Causes,
or motives, on the one hand, human Freedom on the
other, are alike to be admitted ; that we ' must believe
loth, and both in unison;' and that ' this conciliation is
of the things to be believed, not understood.' More-
over, when we find him writing in the 'fragments of a
fuller discussion ' appended in his final E"ote — ' In fact,
' there is a curious conformity, if I may say so, between
' Newton's procedure and our own. Gravity is the
' great constitutive principle in the world of matter ;
' whilst Causation is the highest constitutive and Caus-
' ality the highest regulative principle in the ivorlds both
' of matter and mind ' — Causation throughout ' the
world of mind ' being thus as decisively recognised as

Misapprehended by Mr Mill. 71

Gravity by Newton in the 'world of matter' — it be-
comes utterly impossible to maintain — as Mr Mill is
unhappy enough to attempt doing throughout — that, in
the interest of Freedom, Hamilton intends to dmiy
Causation. That this result in which his mind plainly
reposed — of two things to be believed in as reconcilable,
though to reconcile them our reason is impotent — he
could have reached by any manipulation of the argu-
ment, as he constructs it in the light of his ' Philosophy
of the Conditioned,' with its two ' contradictory Incon-
' ceivables, one, of which must be true, whilst lofh can-
' not,' may probably admit of doubt. Of the famous
Hamiltonian ' Logic,' my knowledge is precisely nil; and
likely, I fear, to remain so. That, by doing something
or other with the Predicate, Sir William could have
walked round the flank of this difficulty, I am perfectly
willing to believe ; but meantime I do not quite see it ;
it seems meantime a little like Freedom, and easier to
be believed than understood. H&re,, perhaps, there roas
a little point to be made against Hamilton; but Mr
Mill has not made it ; and failing to make this point,
it does not appear that he has made any other to speak
of. (How could he, indeed, have made any, his reason-
ings, nearly throughout, being based on so vital a mis-
conception ?) Not improbably Mr Mill saw the point
plainly enough ; but likewise saw that he could not
avail himself of it, and avail himself also of the oilier
point, derived from 'motiveless volition,' and 'action
for no reason in particular.' One, of them he might
have, but not hotli ; and he chose the one which in-

72 Some little Excuse for Mr Mill

volved a direct misrepreseutation of what is unmistak-
ably shown to have been Hamilton's real doctrine. Mr
Mill's ' knowledge of Sir W. Hamilton,' as a mere mat-
ter of course, is almost infinitely greater than mine ;
but at this particular point it does not seem to show
to advantage.

It is to be admitted, however, that in attributing to
Hamilton's doctrine of Freedom 'the emancipation of
the will from Causes,' Mr Mill is not wholly without
excuse. When I wrote, ' Doubtless it is held by
' Hamilton, that Freedom, though inconceivable, as in-
' volving the impossible notion of an " absolute com-
' mencement," is yet as such to be believed ; but it is
' only as an Inconceivable he claims our belief in it,
' not as an impossible " absolute commencement," as Mr
' Mill seems to suppose,' I considered I was justified in
so doing, in the light of the context, as now adduced,
which proves, as I think, beyond dispute, that he can-
not possibly have intended to enunciate the doctrine by
Mr Mill attributed to him. Eigorously interpret his
deliverance, in the light of his ' Doctrine of the Con-
ditioned,' and frankly, I admit, it lies exceedingly open
to the interpretation by Mr Mill put upon it. I don't
say that in representing Hamilton, as in the interest of
Freedom, denying Causes, Mr Mill has no case ; but I
do say, that for Hamilton here, as against him, there is
a case very much stronger ; and I further say that Mr
Mill ought to have known this, had his ' knowledge of
Sir W. Hamilton ' been so greatly superior to mine as
I should myself have been disposed to expect it.

Hamiltons Conciliation. 73

To conclude — let me cite a passage wliich, in the
light of Hamilton's express announcement of his doc-
trine as a ' conciliation of opposite philosophical
opinions/ seems to me pretty conclusive. Having re-
marked that his doctrine alone (as ' conciliatory ' and
recognising a truth on either side — this must needs be
his meaning) affords ' a solution of the problem offered
' in the condition of exact equilibrium, in ■which the
' controversy has continued,' Hamilton proceeds —
' Previous philosophers have held,' &c. ' Those philo-
' sophers who embraced the alternative of Necessity
' virtually extenuated, as delusive, those ultimate data
' of intelligence, which attribute to man, as author or
' master of his actions, a moral agency, responsibility,
' liberty — an undetermined freedom to initiate action.
' Those philosophers, again, who embraced the alterna-
' tive of Liberty, virtually extenuated as delusive, in so
' far as our volitions are concerned, that necessity of
' intelligence which constrains us to seek the com-
' mencement of every event, external or internal, in
' some antecedent, itself determined by a higher ante-
' cedent. The one class did not attempt to render com-
' prehensible an infinite series of relative or determined
' commencements ; the other class did not attempt to
' render comprehensible an absolute or undetermined
' initiative. Both implicitly charged reason,' &c.

Is it to be denied that Hamilton here means to dis-
criminate himself from loth these ' classes of previous
' philosophers,' ' extenuating as delusive,' neither, on
the one hand, the ultimate data which guarantee

74 Seeming Inconsistency of Hamilton.

Freedom, nor, on the other, ' so far as our volitions are
' concerned,' that ' necessity of intelligence which con-
' strains us ' to admit Causation ; and to fix these ' oppo-
' site opinions ' of Freedom and Necessity, by ' previous
' philosophers ' held exclusive each of the other, as
those in his own doctrine harmonised, or ' conciliated '
in lodi&f, though not in intelligence ? It is not, I should
say, even by Mr MUl to be denied. What then of Mr
Mill's ' knowledge of Sir W. Hamilton,' in making him
deny Causation ? AH that seems here to be said of it
is, that one hopes it is greater elsewhere.

It is not uninstructive to note, that out of this very
passage, which seems to seal Mr Mill's condemnation,
he could perfectly well pick some sort of quasi justifi-
cation of himself Hamilton does here certainly seem
to define Liberty as ' an undetermined freedom to initiate
' action,' " an absolute or undetermined initiative,' but
all he can intelligently be held to mean is, that it
admits not of being construed to thought except as this
form of Inconceivable. That under this form it is that
he means to demand belief in it, cannot for an instant
be maintained; for, almost in the same breath, he
implies as ' undelusive ' ' the Necessity of intelligence,
' which constrains us ' to admit volitions determined.
Volitions are at once determined and widetermined,
caused and wicaused ! ! Are these staring contradic-
tories ' the opposite philosophical opinions ' of which
Hamilton intends to announce, that ' we must believe
' both, and both in unison ' ? It may be so ; but if so.

opinions by Hamilton conciliated. 75

he was one of the merest blockheads who ever put pen
to paper ; and it was surely unnecessary for Mr Mill
to write a whole big book about him as the philosopher
of all his school, ' the ablest, the most clear-sighted,
and the most candid.' These are complimentary ex-
pressions, one. at least of which, at this point, I must
hesitate to apply to Mr Mill. Candid he is, I do
believe, even when it might not quite appear ; nobody
ever questioned his superb intellectual abihty ; as to
his ' clear-sightedness,' I should just here have thought
rather more of it had he recognised as mere rash inad-
vertencies of expression and exposition — in what is
professedly no more than a series of mere fragments
tumbled out of a note-book — the things he has seen fit
to represent, as conveying to us Hamilton's matured
and dehberate doctrine.

Mr Mill says, that while declining to believe that
Hamilton could mean to ' rush with his eyes open on
' the staring contradictory of a thing at once caused and
' uncaused,' I myself proceed to ' charge his doctrine
with requiring belief in contrary inconceivables.' ^ In
doing so, I charge it with nothing which he himself
does not proclaim, in saying that it specially approves
itself to him as ' conciliating the most oip'posite, philoso-
phical opinions.' These can positively be nothing but

' From tliis criticism it should seem tliat in Mr Mill's philosophical
vocabulary, the words " contradictory " and "contrary '' are identical
or interchangeable terms. Some little distinction between them has,
however, been surmised by other people.

76 Suspicions of Confusion in Hamilton.

Freedom as inconceivable, and Causation, which, in its
infinite regress, it is his whim to likewise present as
such ; in other schemes held reciprocally destructive,
in his ' conciliated, though this conciliation is of the
' things to he believed, not understood.' If not these,
what are the ' opposite philosophical opinions ' which,
in his Doctrine of Causation and Freedom — sketched
entirely in the rough — Hamilton proposes to con-
ciliate ? No answer on the general question can in the
least be accepted from Mr Mill as valid which does not
include an answer to this question ; and this question
Mr Mill will never be able to answer.

If these contraries, or opposites — in the sense that
logically we are unable to reconcile them — 'both of
' which and both in unison ' are, as result of Hamilton's
reasoning, to be ' believed,' might seem in some part of
the process of it, to figure as the Contradictories of the
Philosophy of the Conditioned, ' one of which must be
true, while both cannot,' this, as I said, is a confusion on
Hamilton's part, on which Mr Mill was entitled, if he
chose, to animadvert, as on Hamilton's other confu-
sions. What clearly he was not entitled to do was to
falsify, for the sake of his points about ' motiveless
volition ' and ' action for no reason in particular,' the
doctriue in which Hamilton's mind plainly rested, and
which, beyond all question, he would have held himself
bound to maintain.

Of the confusion — if it really be so, as to which I am
by no means confident — in which Hamilton is here

Suspicions of Confusion in Hamilton, 'j'j

involved, enough is perhaps said — the quite incondite
and fragmentary character of his jottings on this subject
being looked to — if we say as in the passage Mr Mill
is here criticising, that ' his reconstruction of the argu-
' ment in the light of his Philosophy of the Conditioned,
' has really done it no great service.' A man who has
business in London gets into the wrong coach, and finds
himself deposited at Exeter ; what then ? he next
morning puts himself in the right one ; he is in due
time deposited in London, and claims that his conduct
shall be interpreted throughout in the light of his
manifest intention. So with Hamilton here — as to
where he really means to go, there cannot be a shadow
of doubt ; as to whether he got into the right coach to
take him there, in working from the ' Philosophy of
the Conditioned,' there may reasonably be difference
of opinion.

[My argument, as above, I am happy to be able to
buttress — as against Mr Mill — by the authority of
Professor Bain. In his ISTotes on the MiU v. Hamilton
controversy (vide ' Mental and Moral Science,' p. 426)
he says — " Both Hamilton and Mill are agreed upon
the question at issue — namely, whether our volitions
are emancipated from causation altogether." Professor
Bain, therefore, does not so understand Hamilton, as,
in the interest of the Freedom of the Will, to make
him deny Causation. Mr MiU, however, throughout
in his argument, does so. Mr Mill, though here in

78 Professor Bain v. Mr Mill.

essential agreement with Hamilton (as I agree with
Professor Bain in thinking him), was, unhappily, quite
unaware of it. Professor Bain, on the other hand, in
noting the fundamental agreement between the two,
seems to have lost sight of the superficial divergence
which occurred in Mr Mill's misconception of his op-
ponent's position.]

Vital Truth in Moral Psychology. 79

VIII.

Note— pa^'e 586.

' This vital truth in moral Psychology, that we can im-
prove our character, •;/ we loill, is a great stumbling-block
both to the "Inquirer'' and Mr Alexander. They maiu-
tain that the fact makes no difference at all, and that the
Causation of human actions is exactly the same thing with
Modified Fatalism. Both he and Mr Alexander protest
vehemently, Mr Alexander at great length, that the Causation
doctrine is as incompatible with Free-will as Fatalism is. As
if any one had denied that. In the very next paragraph,
when arguing against Kant, I expressly aflS.rmed it.'

Mr Mill, in one of his 'Notes,' says of Professor
Hansel and the ' Inquirer,' ' that they could not have
' worse understood his argument if they had never
' read it.' Of Mr Mill I take the liberty to say the
same thing here. Had I sought 'vehemently and at
great length,' as Mr Mill alleges, to show that his
' Causation doctrine ' is incompatible with the Freedom
expressly denied in it, I must have been a blunderer
indeed. The idea of my seeking, as Mr Mill's oppon-
ent, to prove to him ' vehemently and at great length '

8o Misunderstanding on Mr Mill's part.

the very thing, which throughout and with some vehe-
mence, he asserts, seems really a little too ludicrous.
To attribute the merest idiocy to one's adversary is
an easy method of confuting him, and not — with Mr
Mill — an unusual one. 'It is the main object of this
' paper to inquire in how far Mr Mill can le held to
' prosper in his attempt to harmonise oior practical waral
' instincts ivith his speculative tenet of Necessity.' Thus
it was, that my purpose was at starting defined ; and
on the whole, it was carried out pretty steadily, though
not, as I speedily came to see, without a certain
amount of blunder and misapprehension, which I am
obliged to Mr Mill for overlooking. To identify Mr
Mill's doctrine of Causation with Fatalism, not in
the denial of Freedom — by both expressly denied — but
in its bearing on the Moral Eesponsibility of man —
in regard of which Mr Mill's distinction between the
two doctrines seemed to me, and still seems, a dis-
tinction utterly illusory — was almost the sole object
of my little Essay. What I did maintain ' vehemently
and at some length,' was not — as Mr Mill here makes
me do — that his ' Causation doctrine ' is ' incompatible
with Free-will,' but that, as distinguished from Fatal-
ism, in this particular regard, it is really in point of
fact ide7itical with it — a doctrine of Freedom^ — in dis-

1 Vide Mill and Oarlyle. — 'Observations these highly edifying
' doubtless, but as used by a Necessitarian, or unconditional Causation-
' ist, conclusive of his mere bewilderment. Mr Mill, it seems, is not
' the Necessitarian he supposes himself, but a wild advocate of Free-
' dom ' (p. 102, 103). ' Again, as we before said, he is not the Neces-
' sitarian he supposes himself, but o frantic advocate of Freedom '

Mr Mill's Doctrine of Catisalion. 8 1

guise. That Mr Mill's 'doctrine of Causation,' as
distinct from a doctrine of Fate, is a miserable mon-
grel ; neither philosophic fish nor flesh, and not in any
thorough-going logical way a ' Doctrine of Causation '
at all, rigorously prosecuted to its results ! This is
what I maintained, and shall meantime, for anything
I see in his well-meant endeavours to make a convert
of me, continue to maintain with quite undiminished
confidence. Mr Mill's doctrine of Causation is some-
what like his Utilitarianism; and finding itself in a
strait, never scruples to worm its way out, by a dexter-
ous surreptitious implication of the opposite doctrine
denied. Probably no thinker of Mr Mill's deserved
eminence, of the same strictness and severity of in-
tellect (in genuine, unaffected admiration of Mr Mill's
consummate ability, in so far as I feel myself com-
petent to estimate it — which is really bat a little way
— I will not yield to even his most ardent admirers),
ever showed himself habitually such an adept, in what
I take leave to call the art of intellectual smuggling. I
have denounced as plainly contrahand Mr Mill's ' Yes,

(p. 104). 'The candour of these admissions is admirable, but of
' course they come easy to Mr Mill, who is really, as we have seen —
' though without as yet being aware of it — himself a very ardent
' advocate of the Doctrine (of Freedom, to wit) he thus celebrates '
(p. 117, 118). And in such passages is indicated the main scope of
the little treatise. What, then, am I to think of Mr Mill, in his
making me 'maintain and protest vehemently,' that his doctrine is
' incompatible with Free-will, ' wherewith it is nearly throughout my
express aim to identify it ? Simply, that Mr Mill, in doing me the
honour to criticise me, has omitted, somehow or other, to do me
the preliminary honour of reading me — an operation commonly held
essential in order to intelligent criticism.

8 2 Inconsistencies of Mr Mill.

' if he really " cotdd not help " it — that is, if it did not
' depend upon his will : ' ^ and I should reaUy like to
know how a man like Mr Mill could ever hope to
pass through the Custom-house an article so distinctly
prohibited as this ! That Mr Mill, by will here ex-
plicitly to himself means Pree-will, no one will of
course assert. What might seem to be the state of the
case is, that here, as elsewhere, he uses the word will
quite vaguely and at random, not very distinctly mean-
ing anything, but giving his argument the advantage

I Is it really necessary, in any formal way, to elaborate a point so
obvious, as that a consistent doctrine of Causation — of unconditional
Causation — leaves to us no more power to help our actions, good, bad,
or indifferent, than if we were simply so much brute matter, involved
in the chain of physical sequences ? A man is determined to act so ;
to suppose him to help his action, is to suppose a difference in the '
effect ; and therein a difference in the cause or antecedent, involving
a difference in the whole previous chain of antecedents. Mr Mill's
distinct implication that — certain specified cases excepted, of physical
constraint, &c. — we can help our actions, is thus in the plainest con-
tradiction with his own doctrine, and a quiet assumption of Freedom,
in an argument professedly Necessitarian. Here, from his Logic, is a
passage precisely parallel — 'Human actions are never (except in some
' cases of mania) ruled by any one motive with such absolute sway that
' there is no room for the influence of any other. The causes, there-
' fore, on which action depends are never uncontrollahle ; and any
' given effect is only necessary, provided that the causes tending to
' produce it are not controlled. ' Suppose that the causes tending to
produce it are not in point of fact controlled ; the effect is then pro-
duced, and according to Mr Mill himself, necessarily so (the reader
will please to observe that the case, as thus put, includes every
human thought, word, or deed, that can ever have taken place, in the
world). How, then, were the causes controllable ? On what possible
terms — from the point of view of the Causationist — not involving the
intrusion of other causes, a whole world of changed antecedents, and
consequents, and solution of the causal continuity ?

Mr Mill's Modified Fatalism. 8 3

of the associations witli Freedom, which in most minds
— including his own — obstinately continue to cling to
it. If in stating his ' vital truth in moral Psychology,
' that we can improve our character, if we will,' he
does not allow himself the same laxity and licence,
nothing can be easier than to show that his formula is
utterly worthless, as discriminating his doctrine from
a Fatalistic one.

And first,! to glance in some casual way at what Mr
Mill calls ' Modified Fatalism.' The modified Fatalist
' holds, that our actions are determined by our will,
' our will by our desires, and our desires by the joint
' influence of the motives ^ presented to us, and of our
' individual character ; but that our character having
' been made for us, and not by us, we are not respon-
' sible for it, nor for the actions it leads to, and should
' in vain attempt to alter them.' Obviously, in this tail
of the definition, so to speak, hes its main import.
Elsewhere I have said of it that, as ' contingency
clings to our conception of the future,' whether we

^ Throughout more diffuse than I could have wished, I must here
"beg pardon of the reader for a diffuseness even greater than usual.
The point at issue here — my former rapid remarks on which are flawed
with serious error — is positively central to the whole discussion. As
such, wishing to treat of it, as far as might be, exhaustively, 1 have
chosen rather to be prolix than perfunctory.

2 The word motoes here Mr Mill uses inaccurately, as noted (p. 11).
He means, of course, not ' ' desires or aversions " — his own definition of
motives (for he could hardly intend to say that "our desires are
determined by the joint influence of the desires," &c. ) — but the objects
of desire and aversion presented to us — the ' ' external motives, " as
he elsewhere inaccurately calls them.

84 Modified Fatalism.

believe in Free-will or in Fate — the thing which will,
or is to he, being in either case, meantime, for us in-
determinate — ' should in vain have attempted to alter
them,' might perhaps be the preferable way of putting
it. Mr Mill will scarce allege, that in making so
trivial an alteration as this, I ' break down a funda-
mental distinction,' or do more than merely simpli^
the statement by eliminating the element of con-
tingency. This slight and surely inessential altera-
tion supposed by Mr Mill acquiesced in, is not he,
from the point of view of the Causationist, shut up
to acquiescence in it otherwise, or as helief? Most
obviously he is ; for the man to have successfully
' attempted to alter,' would have been to have hdped
his action ; to have interpolated a new, arbitrary, or
uncaused effect, therein disrupting and confounding
the whole chain of causal sequences. It does not seem
quite easy for Mr Mill to escape from ' Modified
Fatalism,' as in his own terms defined — unless, indeed,
to say 'should in vain have attempted,' instead of
' should in vain attempt ' be to ' break down a funda-
mental distinction.' Mr Mill is, not improbably, quite
capable, at a pinch, of asserting this ; and it is not
to be doubted, that should he do so, he would find a
great many acute people to agree with him. Where-
fore, in case such a thing should occur, let us get
back for an instant to Mr Mill's ' should in vain
attempt to alter them.' It is certain — what is to he,
icill he — and this alike for the believer in Free-will
and the Fatalist. As Causationist, but not Fatalist,

Mr Mill as Prophet. 85

Mr Mill expressly holds that, were all the causes
known to us, and were our intelligence competent to
deal with the complex process of them, we could con-
fidently predict the will he of a man's action — say a
month hence — in any particular emergency ; as con-
fidently as we predict that a stone, if detached from
its support, will fall to the earth. How reconcile Mr
Mill's asserted power of 'predicting the man's action,
with a power in the man to alter that action ? Seems
it not plain that, either Mr Mill cannot, in such a
case, predict, or that there can be no power in the
man to alter the thing which Mr Mill predicts ? To
successfully ' attempt to alter ' would be to falsify Mr
Mill's prediction. If Mr Mill, as Causationist and
Prophet in the mood potential, be not a ' Modified
Patalist,' as defined in his own terms, there seems
little doubt that, as accurate reasoner, he ought so to
be. Professor Mansel, after all, then, was not quite
so much out as Mr Mill would have had us suppose
him, when, in answer to Mr Mill's ' no more than this
' (assumed power of prediction) is contended for by
' any one but an Asiatic Fatalist,' he wrote — ' and no
' more than this is needed to construct a system of
' Fatalism as rigid as any Asiatic can desire.'

That there may be no doubt whatever as regards Mr
Mill's position assumed here, it may be weU to refer —
even at the risk of some redundancy — to the last sen-
tence of the concluding paragraph of his chapter : —
' Because something will certainly happen, if nothing
' is done to prevent it, they (the Fatalists) think it will

86 Necessity one with Mi^ Mill's ' True Doctrine.'

' certainly happen, whatever may be done to prevent
' it ; in a word, they believe in Necessity, in the only
' proper meaning of the term — an issue unaltercMe by
' human efforts or desires.' From this, the doctrine
of Necessity proper, or Fate, is contradistinguished
Mr Mill's ' ill-understood doctrine of so-called Neces-
sity,' or ' true doctrine of Causation,' which includes, as
of course we must suppose, a belief in issues alter-
able by human efforts and desires ; and the distinction
is announced a ' fundamental ' one, which Professor
Mansel is roundly rated for trying to 'break down.'
We shall see, on a very little examination, that Mr
Mill himself has broken down dreadfully in trying to
set it up. Take any human issue in the past, certain
' human efforts and desires ' concurred to produce,
caused it. By what human efforts or desires does Mr
Mill suppose it to have been by possibility alterable ?
Not surely by the efforts and desires which caused it !
Mr Mill cannot mean to maintain this ! He must
needs intend an implication of other efforts and de-
sires which in point of fact did not cause it, and could
not cause anything else, seeing they did not exist ;
and if this implication be not to intrude new ante-
cedents dependent on no previous antecedents, and
into the 'true doctrine of Causation' to insinuate /ree
origination, and the 'absolute commencement' of
Hamilton, there has ceased to be virtue in Logic.
Again, suppose the issue a future one ! and future
issues are, according to Mr Mill, so certain, that —
the conditions supposed given us — we could with

Fate and the '■Tr^le Doctrine' identical. 87

absolute confidence predict them. Once more, by
what ' efforts and desires ' does Mr Mill think this
certain issue alterable ? By the efforts and desires
which, as cause of the issue, we of course must
foresee in foreseeing the issue ? This can hardly be.
By other ' efforts and desires,' then, which we do not
foresee, for the admirable reason, that unless all
seq^uence of Causation be annulled, we see them to
be absurd and impossible? Mr Mill is positively
bound to maintain this last ! !

Could the proof be more clear, that between the
doctrine of Fate, or Necessity, in the only true meaning
of the term, and Mr Mill's ' iU-understood doctrine
of so-called Necessity,' or priceless 'true doctrine of
Causation,' there is no distinction whatever? Irre-
fragably, Mr Mill's ' doctrine of Causation,' in so far
as it seeks to sever itself from a doctrine of Tate, or
Necessity is the only proper sense of the term, becomes
a so-called ' Doctrine of Causation,' or Doctrine of Free-
dom in disguise. Seems it not deplorably evident,
that Mr Mill's 'ill-understood' doctrine of "so-called
Necessity,' or Causation, is but poorly understood —
by himself? No wonder it has puzzled other people
a little ! (Professor Cairnes, for instance — see Preface.)
To pass to the 'true doctrine of Causation,' as by
Mr Mill himself discriminated from that of Fate,
given in his statement already quoted ! ' The true
' doctrine of the Causation of human actions main-
' tains, in opposition to this, that not only our con-
' duct, but our character, is in 'part amenable to our

88 The ' Vital Tritth in Moral Psychology!

' will; that we can, by employing the proper means,
' improve our character ; and that if our character is
' such that while it remains what it is, it necessitates
' us to do wrong, it will be just (expedient ?) to apply
' motives which will necessitate us to strive for its
' improvement, and so emancipate ourselves from the
' other necessity. In other words, we are under a
' moral obligation to seek the improvement of our
' moral character.'

The dictum — not denied, I believe, by any one —
that ' we can by employing the proper means improve
our character,' is now again before us as 'this vital
' truth in Moral Psychology that we can improve our
' character, if we, will.' (I shall admit the italics
significant, when I find it alleged by a philosopher of
the opposite school, that we can improve our charac-
ter, if we, wo7i't.) As such, it claims our very particu-
lar attention. And some separate attention must be
given to Mr Mill's other dictum, that 'the character
is (in part) amenable to the will.' (As the merest
matter of course, on grounds elsewhere stated, the
'in part' may be dropt as of no importance.) Mr
Mill is of course profoundly unaware, that these two
dicta put forth by him in the same sentence, are in
essential meaning wide as the poles asunder. Such,
however, is the case ; the first — Freedom of course
denied — in no respect whatever distinguishing Mr
Mill's doctrine from that of Fate ; the other being a
plain implication of that of Free-will denied. This
I proceed to show.

The ' Vital Truth in Moral Psychology! 89

And, first— as to Mr Mill's 'vital truth in Moral
Psychology,' as, in relation to the moral problem,
discriminating his Doctrine from one of ' Modified
Pate.' That 'we can improve our character if we
vnll' is, I fancy, not denied by any one not also
denying the equally important truth that if we will,
we can deteriorate our character. But how this power
possessed by us through the will, should any way alter
the position, if over the will itself — as Mr Mill of
course holds — we have no power, quite declines to
become obvious. To have no power over the will by
which only the character can be modified, is plainly,
to have no power to modify the character. It is absurd
to say that over the end we have power, all power
over the means being denied us. Wherefore, unless
by will here, Mr Mill — as indeed is usual with him —
means free will without being aware of it, he will, I
fear, be obliged to admit that we cannot modify our
character ; that however our character may be modi-
fied, it is really modified for us ; that even whilst a
man's character seems to be modified ' hy him, as one
of the intermediate agents,' 1 it is, in the strictest sense,

^ Vide Logic. "In the words of the sect (the Owenites), which in
our own day has so perseveringly inculcated, and so perversely mis-
understood this great doctrine " (the doctrine I am engaged in criticis-
ing), " his character is formed /or him, and not hy him ; therefore his
wishing that it had been formed diffierently is of no use ; he has no
power to alter it. But this is a grand error. He has, to a certain
extent, a power to alter his character. Its heing in the ultimate
resort formed for him, is not inconsistent with its heing, in part,
formed by him as one of the intermediate agents," cfec. A passage
this, which is really in its way quite wonderful. I should suppose that.

90 Mr Mill gets not inuck Good of it.

modified for liim, as merely tlie lielpless instrument
through which an alien energy transmits itself along
the infinite procession of causes. The moral personality
of man is plainly, from this point of view, abolished.

We are thus, in terms of the reasoning as above —
which, as not mine,''- I venture to suppose unanswer-
able — 'not morally responsible for our character, or
for the actions it leads to.' Varying the statement a
little — for it amounts to no more — this is otherwise
sufficiently obvious. "We have abundantly seen, that
Mr Mill, in implying that men can help their actions,
does manifest outrage to his own professed doctrine,
as Causationist. Given a particular action, Mr Mill
— though perhaps reluctantly — must admit that as
the inevitable outcome of his character, the man could
not possibly help it. Is Mr Mill here capable of
alleging — Oh ! but he might have improved his char-
acter so as to be aile to help it? Sincerely, one
hopes not. For to improve or to deteriorate our
character is simply to act in some such way as may
induce these respective results. And as Mr Mill him-
self well says (criticising Kant, and as we see, in so
doing, shearing his own legs away) — ' There cannot be

if we are to think out a subject, it is "the ultimate resort" which
chiefly, or even solely, concerns us. Further, in admitting the
agency "intermediate" — i.e., inevitably determined — like every
other, — as merely the last link in the chain of causal sequence, — it is
surprising Mr Mill should not have seen that he remained fixed fast
as before in the bonds of a purely Fatalistic theory.

1 David Hume — not I— is in point of fact responsible for it ; see
Note at close of the Discussion. — Appendix, Note III.

The Character amenable to the Will. 9 1

' one theory for one class of actions and another theory
' for another.' If the man ' could not h.d'p ' his bad
action, as birth of his evil character, as little could he
' possibly help the series of previous actions, by which
that character was developed to evil, and not to good.
Consequently, under Mr Mill's own — ' Yes ; if he
reaUy " could not help " acting as he did,' from which,
as aforetime announced, and noiu with full deliberation
repeated, he cannot with any grace retreat — the sinner
is absolved from all moral responsibility, for his char-
acter alike and his actions.

I have thus doubly shown that Mr Mill's one dictum,
' we can improve our character if we will,' cannot, if
conjoined with denial of Preedoni, be rationally, in its
moral bearings, distinguished from a doctrine of Fate.
I proceed to show, and show doubly (if only to
symmetrise the discussion), that his other dictum —
' the character is amenable to the wiU,' is, except as an
implication of the Freedom denied, a foi'm of words to
which we can attach no rational meaning whatever.
'The Character is amenable to the Will!' Yet,
plainly, there can be nothing in the Will which was
not previously in the Character. The Character is a
product of the Will, the Will a product of the Charac-
ter ! Was there ever a more vicious circle ? What
are we really to make of Mr Mill's ' the character is
amenable to the will,' and modified by it, coupled with
its converse, even vehemently held to by Mr Mill, that
the will is so wholly amenable to the character as to
be its mere necessitated product ? All that any one

92 The Character amenable to the Will.

will ever be able to make of it is an announcement of
a self-modifying character. This, in effect, or nothing,
is the doctrine to which Mr Mill is here committed.
But how a self-modifying or self- determining cliaracter
is any whit more explicable than the self-determining
will, to which his objection is insuperable, or indeed,
is at aU to be distinguished from it, Mr Mill will find
it not easy to explain. Oddly enough, Mr Mill acutely
sees this point ; and on the very opposite page presses
it, as against Kant. What he lacks the acuteness to
see is, that in applying the scythe to Kant he most
effectually, as we saw a little ago, mows his own luckless
legs off. (Eeaders sufficiently interested in the subject
are referred to the book itself, where they will find this
novel operation in surgery in the most masterly manner
performed.)

Again — is the man one thing ; the will of the man
another thing ; and the character of the man a third
thing 1 Are not rather the three terms, however
superficially discriminated, fundamentally in meaning
identical ? We speak of a had character as meaning a
bad man ; and this with really greater philosophical
accuracy than in saying that such an one has a bad
character. A character is not something external to,
and possessed by the man, like a sum of money in his
breeches' pocket ; it is the veritable man himself, re-
garded from the point of view of the Moralist. So
likewise of the Will, which is not any kind of spiritual
arm or leg, as it were, which the man makes use of as
he does of these bodily members ; but very literally

Really means Freedom, or — Nothing. 93

' the mau willing' or operative in volitional act. Tide,
Hamilton — ' The will is merely an abbreviated expres-
sion for the man willing.' That again, the character
and the will, as each thus identified with the man, are
really identical with each other, is sufficiently familiar
to Mr Mill, who (see Logic) quotes with approval
Novalis, to the effect that ' a character is a completely
fashioned ivill.' This being so — and the very slightest
reflection will show it can be no otherwise — the man,
the character of the man, and the ivill of the man being
merely three words, in essential meaning the same,
what of Mr Mill's ' character amenable to the Will,'
and modified by it? It is seen to be utterly without
meaning, except as a man, will, or character, seZZ-modi-
fying, or otherwise — Free.-'

^ In addition to the difficulties really essential to it, this subject is
constantly liable to he heset hy others originating in the accumulation
about it of terms almost inevitable to be made use of, but which yet
are rationally superfluous. Such are Will and Volition, which are
really no more than mere words, to which nothing in existence corre-
sponds. Voluntary, as distinguished from mvoluntary action, is
simply action of which, as wiotive, we are conscious j and the Will can
be nothing but the man himself operative in his conscious act. But
so soon as, in current phrase, we begin to speak of the Will of the
man — of the will as something which the man Aas— inevitably we are
apt to forget this, and to lapse into grievous confusions. So also with
volition, which — somewhat as Byron surmised that Junius was ' really,
truly, nobody at all ' — cannot be apprehended as anything distinct
from the act, in which it appears— to use a strong metaphor — incar-
nate. Volition is no more than a word by which we have agreed to
bridge over that chasm of unknown process, which intervenes between
the man in the condition of desire or motive, and the man as he flashes
into act. By the slightest attention, who will may convince himself
that between the desire and the act there is no intermediate mental
state or act corresponding to the term volition. The volition and the

94 The ' Vital Truth ' the merest Truism.

Of the doctrines of rreedom and Fate, we have thus
in Mr Mill's reasonings seen plenty ; but of the via
media announced as ' the true Doctrine of Causation/
as yet we have seen nothing. It has only been heard
of from Mr Mill, an oracle addressing us hitherto from
the awful cloud of confusion. Let us see whether from
the one point of view which remains, this oracle can
be interpreted in any such way as would suit its
oracular pretensions? As I said — 'to improve our
character by employing the proper means' is simply
to act in the particular manner fitted to produce that
result — and so of deteriorating our character. What,
then, does Mr Mill's ' we can improve our character if
we will ' really, after all, amount to ? Simply to this
tritest and most trivial of truisms — that if we effectively
will a particular action, we can perform it. Thus, if
I have the little misfortune to be a drunkard, there
is chance I might ' improve my character ' by staying

act are not, as Hamilton would have phrased it, ' numerically differ-
ent. ' Of the confusions not unlikely to arise in their being so con-
sidered, the following is a good instance {Mill on Hamilton) — 'Direct
' power over my volitions, I am conscious of none. In common with
' one half of the psychological world, I am wholly ignorant of my
' possessing any such power.' Mr Mill (System of Logic) — ' Their will
has no direct jjower except over their own actions.' (If Mr Mill, to
escape from a difficulty, is disposed to maintain that by ' their will '
here — the will of the men — he means anything different from the
men themselves, as willing, it will be easy, on his saying what he
means, to prove that he does not mean anything.) Thus, according
to Mr Mill, he has power over his actions, but over the necessary in-
termediates or means, called volitions, he has no power. How ever
could Mr Mill explain this except as a power of acting without voli-
tions, yet with them, inasmuch as his acts are voluntary ; of acting
voluntarily at once and mvoluntarily ?

A Truism by no Fatalist denied. 95

away from the public-house. Who questions that if I
will to stay away from the public-house, I can stay
away ; or, unless he were a deep philosopher, would
think of calling such a thing by so big a name as ' a
Vital truth in moral Psychology'? Admitting it a
vital and important truth, is it any whit more vital
and important than its fellow, that, if I will to go to
the public-house, I can go to it ? Was ever such a
mountain of philosophic intelligence, as Mr Mill is on
all hands admitted, delivered of a mouse so ridiculous ?
Was ever so ridiculous a mouse, when its parent came
to give it a name, thus monstered into something like
an elephant ? Mr Mill here reminds me of nothing so
much as of a child blowing its bubble in the sun and
entranced with its own performance. Lo you ! the
little orb ascends, glowing with prismatic radiance ;
do but prick it with the merest needle-point, and it
descends in a drop of dirty water. ' We can improve
our character if we vnlV, if we will, we can deteriorate
our character; according as we may chance to will
either way, we can go to the public-house or not go.
So in the concrete interpreted, in this there is plainly
nothing but ' the liberty as to which,' as Hume says,
' there can be no subject of dispute ; if we choose to
' remain at rest, we may ; if we choose to move, we also
' may' — what Hamilton calls ' the liberty of Spontaneity
(to Do as we will), a liberty which no Fatalist ever dis-
allowed.' This, which no Fatalist ever disallowed, or
needs disallow, which nobody, in fact, would dream of
disallowing, were he thrice over Fatalist, is what dis-

96 The Fatalist and Moral Causationist.

criminates Mr Mill's ' true doctrine of Causation ' from
the doctrine (obnoxious) of Fate ! ! ^

Mr Mill gives a slight sketch of the extremely in-
telligible modus, in which his ' moral Causationist, desir-
' ing to improve his character, may do it by the iise of
' proper means ; ' and he contrasts with him the ' modi-
fied Fatalist,' who ' will not use these means, for he
will not believe in their efficacy.'^ He then winds up

' In the above I have simply expanded the criticism on Mr Mill at
this point, indicated by Dr Travis in liis interesting work, Moral
Freedom reconciled with Causation — h/ the Analysis of the Process of
Self- Determination. By Henry Travis, M. D. London : Longmans,
Green, and Co., 1865.

' Mr Mill's Logic — "If we examine closely we shall iind that this

' ' feeling of being able to modify our character if we wish, is itself

' ' the feeling of moral freedom which we are conscious of. A person

' ' feels morally free who feels that his habits or his temptations are

"not his masters, but he theirs ; who, even in yielding to them,

"knows that he could resist," ' &c. But to be able to modify our

character, without having power to determine our volitions, is only to

have power to perform the acts which are requisite to produce the

result ; and this is only what is called freedom to act, to which the

Necessitarian doctrine, even in its less qualified form, is not opposed !

—(P. 36, 37.)

Dr Travis's book — as its title implies — professes to conciliate in
Intelligence the 'opposite opinions' which, according to Hamilton,
can only be conciliated in Belief In my opinion, it quite fails to do
so, almost as a matter of course. It is not the less an excellent and
instructive work ; and a reader must be very unusually well informed
on the subject, who will not derive something from its close and care-
ful preliminary risumi of the argument on both sides.

" ' Suppose that a person dislikes some part of his own character,
' and would be glad to change it. He cannot, as he well knows,
' change it by a mere act of volition. He must use the means which
' nature gives to ourselves, as she gives to our parents and teachers, of
' influencing our characters by appropriate circumstances. If he is a
' Modified Fatalist, Jte will not use those means, for he will not believe

The Fatalist and Moral Causationist. 97

— ' I cannot suppose my critics capable of maintaining
' that such a difference as this between the two theories,
' is of no practical importance ; and I must with all
' courtesy decline to recognise as entitled to any voice
' in the question, whoever is not able to seize a distinc-
' tion so broad and obvious.'

A Fatalist, as Mr MiU here defines him, is a person
who ' disbelieves in the efficacy of means '■ — who, being
a drunkard, says — ' a drunkard I am fated to remain ; ^
' it is no matter, therefore, whether I stay away from
' the customary public-house, or go to it. Of course I
' can at will do either ; but it really does not matter
' which I do ; the result, as fated, must be the same ! '
This gentleman, supposed, is a Patalist, and a fool to
boot ; what, in effect, he is capable of saying is, that

' m their efficacy ; but will remain passively discontented with himself,
' or, what ia worse, will learn to be contented, thinking that his
' character has been made for him, and that he cannot make it over
' again, however willing. If, on the contrarj', he is a Moral Causa-
' tionist, he will know that the work is not finally and irrevocably
' done ; that the improvement of his character is still possible by the
' proper means, the only condition being that he should desire what
' by the supposition, he does desire ; consequently, if the desire is
' stronger than the means are disagreeable, he "will set about doing
' that, which if done, will improve his character.' — (P. 586, 587.)

^ Why suppose any one capable of this ? If a man is a Fatalist and
a drunkard, he must very well know that other people have been
drunkards like himself, who yet afterwards became models of sobriety.
Their character, at first determined for them to drunkenness, was
afterwards determined /or them to sobriety. In these cases — with no
harm to Fatalistic Theory — ' the work was not finally and irrevocably
done. ' Why must a man cease to be a Fatalist, and become what Mr
MiU calls a Moral Causationist, in order to believe that possibly in
his case also, ' the work is not finally and irrevocably done ' ?

G

gS Mr Mill's Fatalist an Idiot.

he must remain a drunkard, whether or no he gives up
his habit of drinking. A cessation from drink is the
mmn by which he may cease to be a drunlcard ; and of
this mean he ' does not believe in the efficacy.' Mr
Mill may call him a ' Modified Fatalist ' if he will ; I
should prefer to call him, for my own part, a quite un-
modified idiot. A man of this sort — his house being
on fire aboiit his ears — would say — ' If I am fated to be
' burnt, I shall be burnt — I need not, therefore, take the
' trouble to walk out.' Except that, indeed, his pro-
cedure would indicate a certain 'belief in the efficacy
of means,' he might as well at once plunge headlong
into the flames ; for, even if we suppose him to escape
them, it is plain he could not long survive. Such a
man would presently decline food, on the ground that,
if he was fated to be starved to death, he would be so ;
and starved he would accordingly be. Fatalists of this
particular type, are, I should imagine, rare; Mr Mill
seems to indicate that he has known several specimens ;
I can only regret, for my own part, that I have not
been equally fortunate.

There is, however, another type of Fatalist, with
which I am more familiar ; and it is a type, by Mr
Mill himself glanced at in his closing paragraph
already alluded to — ' Before leaving the subject, it is
' worth while to remark, that not only the doctrine of
' Necessity' (as distinguished from the 'true doctrine
' of Causation,' belike), ' but Predestination in its
' coarsest form, if combined with a belief that God
' works according to general laws, which have to be

Another type of Fatalist. 99

' learnt from experience, lias no tendency to make us act
' in any respect otherwise than we should do, if we
' thought our actions really contingent' &c. &c.

This kind of Fatalist 'believes in the efficacy of
' means ' — employs them just as if he believed in Free-
will ; and believes, in so employing them, that this also
is Fate; that the end (unknown) being fated, the
employment of the means also is. And between a
Fatalist of this kind, and Mr Mill, as Moral Causa-
tionist, consistently developing his doctrine, I confess I
am ' able to seize no distinction.' Between Mr Mill's
doctrine and that of the other fatalist, adduced by Mr
Mill for his argumentative purpose of contrast, I do
seize a distinction — that, namely, between a doctrine,
as it exists in the mind of a narrow blockhead who sees
only one corner of a subject, and mis-sees even that,
and as it lives in the mind of a man of wide and pierc-
ing intelligence like Mr Mill, who sees, at least, a good
deal more of it. And than this — the distinction between
a doctrine, as held by a sage and an idiot, few distinc-
tions are more ' broad and obvious,' or of greater ' prac-
tical importance.' If this distinction — important and
obvious, yet not, I admit, 'fundamental ' — be not ' broad'
enough for Mr Mill, I must e'en submit, as I may, to
be told that, ' with all courtesy, he declines to recognise
' me as entitled to any voice in the question.' What
need I say in reply, except — with an emulous refine-
ment of courtesy — that whether or no, I care not, as
declining to recognise in Mr Mill on this subject, even
a semblance of authority ?

loo A amozis Dictum.

To go on with Mr Mill's note — ' Mr Alexander's
' curious dictum that a motive is itself an act, can only
' have a true meaning, or any meaning at all, if under-
' stood of this indirect influence of our voluntary acts
' over our mental dispositions. That a person can, by
' an act of will, either give to himself or take away from
' himself a desire or an aversion, I suppose even Mr
' Alexander will hardly affirm ; but we can, by a course
' of self-culture, finally modify, to a greater or less
' extent, our desires or aversions ; which is the doctrine
' of Moral Causation, as distinguished from Modified
' Patalism.'

As regards Mr Mill's remark on what he calls ' Mr
' Alexander's curious dictum, that a motive is itself an
' act', nothing need really be said, except that, how-
ever Mr Mill might be pleased to consider it curious,
it ought not at least to have been novel to him ? A
motive being defined in Mr Mill's unexceptionable
terms as ' a desire or aversion,' the thing is as old as
Epictetus, whom Mr Mill must surely have read —
' III nostra potestafe est opinio, appetitio, desideriurn,
' aversatio, et, ut uno complectar verbo, quslibet
' nostrse actiones.' It is also to be found in another
writer, whom Mr Mill must be supposed to have read
— though at odd times, as we have seen, there might
almost seem reason to doubt of this — to wit. Sir W.
Hamilton. ' We are unable to conceive an act of will
' as not an effect, — i.e., as undetermined by a motive ;
' and if we identify, as we may, the motive with an
' anterior act of will, we fall at once,' &c. Whether a

Mr Mill's Idiot again, loi

motive, (defined as a desire) be with utmost accuracy to
be called an act, who will may decide. I should rather
suppose not : but that the mass of our desires compli-
cate themselves with act, as in definite relation to the
will, whereby, to a certain extent, they may be stimu-
lated or controlled at pleasure, will not, I suppose, be
denied by any one ; and this was all that was needed
to constitute my argument aimed at. Mr MiU is
thus not very far from the mark, in saying that my
' curious dictum ' ' can only have a true meaning,
' or any meaning at all, if understood of this indirect
' influence of our voluntary acts over our mental
' dispositions.' But does Mr Mill really suppose,
that any rational Fatalist would think himself
interested to deny such an influence ? that by includ-
ing in his own ' doctrine of Causation ' this ' indirect
' influence of our voluntary acts over our mental dis-
' positions,' he discriminates it from a doctrine of Fate ?
If so, he is a prey to the merest hallucination. A
Fatalist, an intelligent Fatalist— I do not concern my-
self with the idiot, whom, under the title of Fatalist,
Mr Mill erects into a philosopher — would admit, in the
frankest way, what no rational creature denies — 'the
influence of voluntary acts over the dispositions; ' but
he would refer them to the previous dispositions, and
maintain that dispositions and acts alike were involved
in the circle of Fate. And, unless by once again airing
his idiot upon us, as the only authentic Fatalist, Mr
Mill, so far as I can see, would have no reply to ofl"er.
As to Mr Mill's — ' "We can by a course of self-cul-

I02 Rational Fatalism.

ture finally modify/ &c. &c., the answer to it is pre-
cisely identical. It will be plain, in the light of what
I have already said, that no Fatalist needs seek to deny
all this. A rational Fatalist may as frankly admit, or
assert it, as Mr John Stuart Mill himself, who, as
' Moral Causationist' (whatever tlfiat may mean — and I
profess that, after my very best study, I do not in the
least know), considers it a peculium, or exclusive pro-
perty, to him.

Fate and Moral Distinctions. lo.-

IX.

I HAVE uow considered at every point important
enough to call for special remark, the ' Notes ' to Mr
Mill's Chapter, in which he is good enough, by name,
to recognise me. In addition to these, I observe, in-
corporated with his text, a paragraph of some length
and elaboration, which is pretty plainly intended —
though expressly I am not mentioned — to rebut cer-
tain strictures I had ventured to make on one of
Mr Mill's arguments. Mr Mill (page 509, 1st ed.)
beino- minded to maintain, that even on the extremest
hypothesis of Fate, 'moral distinctions' would still
continue to exist, not only as recognised (which is one
thino-) but as real (which is quite another, though Mr
Mill seems throughout unaware of this) illustrated his
position by supposing two distinct breeds of human
creatures, destitute alike of Free-wiU, and irresistibly
determined, respectively, by the very constitution of
their nature, to the extremes of good and of evil. The
distinctions between the actions of these two classes
of creatures, according to Mr Mni, would not the less
be moral distinctions. This I peremptorily denied;
assertino' that in such a case, the distinctions would be

I04 Mr Mill not intending to beg the Qtcestion,

mere distinctions of utility, simply as such; distinc-
tions of good and evil indeed, in the sense of benefit
and injury, yet not without plain absurdity, to be con-
secrated as distinctions of moral good and evil. In
the passage which he now interpolates, a certain ground
of justice in my criticism, Mr Mill seems candidly dis-
posed to admit (p. 574, 3d ed.)

' An opponent may say,' he writes, ' that this is not
' a distinction between moral good and evil ; and / am
'far from, intending to beg the question against him.
' But neither can he be permitted to beg the question
' by assuming that the distinction is not moral because it
' does not imply Free-will.' Now this, most distinctly
I did not do; and to represent me as so doing (though
I am not by name mentioned, there cannot, I suppose,
be a doubt, that Mr MiU here refers to my remarks)
is simply plain misstatement. Without hint of a ref-
erence to Free-will in the matter, it seemed sufficient
for my purpose to observe, that Mr Mill's well-dis-
posed breed, instead of being ' honoured as demigods,'
according to Mr Mill's notion, would more probably
be despised as idiots — amiable idiots indeed, or inno-
cents, but not likely, as such, to become objects of
devoted Hero-worship ; that, on the other hand, his
emZ-disposed breed was by his own very definition of
it, identified with the class of homicidal maniacs ; and
that unless maniacs were to be held moral agents,
these creatures precisely identical could not be so
held. And the sum of the matter was, that Mr Mill
was not a little absurd in seeking to illustrate moral

Begs it, 105

distinctions by the actions of creatures thus shown to
have no moral agency. Unless, indeed, Mr Mill might
chance to hold (as perhaps in point of fact he does)
that in order to moral action or agency, no moral
agents are needed. At what precise point of my argu-
ment here, I ' assume that the distinction is not moral
because it does not imply Free-will,' Mr Mill, if I do
not greatly mistake, would find himself much puzzled
to indicate.-^

It is not a little amusing, that Mr Mill, having for-
mally announced that he ' is far from intending to beg
this question ' against me, with an admirable philoso-
phical composure, proceeds the very next instant, to
h&g it, over a whole page and a half : —

' The reality of moral distinctions, and the freedom
' of our volitions, are questions independent of one
' another. My position is, that a human being who
' loves, disinterestedly and consistently, his feUow-
' creatures, and whatever tends to their good, who
' hates with a vigorous hatred what causes them evil,
' and whose actions correspond in character with those

^ Had I anywhere in my argument implied that the moral distinc-
tion between a sane man and a maniac is, that the one has Free-will,
the other not, Mr Mill might have had some colour for his statement.
But I did not anywhere do this. Assuming, what every one admits,
that a maniac — on whatever ground — is not a moral agent, I identified
with maniacs Mr Mill's evil brmd of human creatures, on no more
abstruse consideration than this, that by the very definition of them,
as Mr Mill himself allowed, or indeed asserted, they could only be
' regarded as noxious beasts ' and treated accordingly. The question
of Free-will at this point I left completely in abeyance ; to have done
otherwise would have been to be guilty as by Mr Mill libelled.

1 06 Over a whole Page and a half.

' feelings, is naturally, necessarily, and reasonably, an
' object to be loved, admired, sympathised ■with, and
' in all ways cherished and encouraged by mankind ;
' while a person who has none of these qualities, or so
' little that his actions continually jar with the good
' of others, and that for purposes of his own he is
' ready to inflict on them a great amount of evil, is a
' natural and legitimate object of their fixed aversion,
' and of conduct conformable thereto ; and this whether
' the will be free or not, and even independently of any
' theory of the difference between right and wrong ;
' whether right means productive of happiness, and
' wrong productive of misery, or right and wrong are
' intrinsic qualities of the actions themselves, provided
' only we recognise that there is a difference, and that
' the difference is highly important. What I maintain
' is, that this is a suflBicient distinction between moral
' good and evil ; sufficient for the ends of society, and
' sufficient for the individual conscience — that we need
' no other distinction ; that, if there be any other dis-
' tinction we can dispense with it ; and that supposing
' acts in themselves good or evil to be as uncondition-
' ally determined from the beginning of things as if
' they were phenomena of dead matter, still if the
' determination from the beginning of things has been
' that they shall take place through my love of good,
' and hatred of evil, I am a proper object of esteem
' and affection ; and if that they shall take place
'through my love of self and indifference to good, I
' am a fit object of aversion, which may rise to abhor-

Mr Mill's mode of doing so. 107

' rence. And no competently informed person will
' deny that, as a matter of fact, those who have held
' this creed have had as strong a feeling, both emo-
' tional and practical, of moral distinctions, as any
' other people.'

In all this, I find nothing but steady dogmatic
assertion, commended to the reader by Mr Mill's
consummate mastery of clear and ingenious state-
ment, the art of which in this case consists in heaping
up about the subject a profusion of emotional terms, —
' esteem, affection, aversion, admiration, abhorrence,'
&c. &c. &c., beset with inevitable moral associations,
Mr Mill's title to profit by which is the very matter
in dispute. In this mode of begging a question, Mr
Mill seldom indeed fails to exhibit himself an adept.
To Mr Mill's dogmatic assertion here, a steady dog-
matic counter-assertion, with a request that he wiU be
good enough to prove that the aversion and abhorrence
he speaks of could, on clear grounds of reason stated,
substantiate themselves as moral aversion and abhor-
rence, seems the fit and sufficient answer ; and if
anything further were needed, the easy method of
reply which sufficed for his first crude statement may
very well suffice for this later one, which only differs
from the first as somewhat more plausibly padded
out. Let us suppose a man whose 'acts are uncon-
ditionally determined ' to a particular extreme of evil,
' as if they were phenomena of dead matter,' and who
rushes into homicide, let us say, by a chronic impulse
of rage as irresistible as the law by which a stone

1 08 Easy Method with Mr Mill,

unattached inevitably falls to the ground. It would
be interesting to know how Mr Mill would discrimi-
nate such a man from a homicidal maniac.'- He can-
not allege his use of reason ; for, &x hypothesi, he has
no such use of it as could avail him for avoidance of
the crime ; neither can he say, that whilst the maniac
is not so, the man is ' amenable to motive ; ' for again,
inasmuch as the motive could not possibly deter, the
man was not really ' amenable ' to it. Pending Mr
Mill's demonstration of difference between them, I
venture to assume the homicidal man, irresistibly de-
termined to murder as stones are to fall to the earth,

1 Perhaps Mr Mill had better not attempt to do so, as it does not
seem likely he would succeed. Vide passage in his Logic hefore com-
mented on (p. 83) ; — ' Human actions are never (except in some cases
' of mania) ruled by any one motive with such absolute sway that
' there is no room for the influence of any other. The causes, there-
' fore, on which action depends are never uncontrollable.' I have
already remarked that this statement is really a Free-will one, as in
manifest outrage of the doctrine of unconditional Causation. What
seems here to be remarked is, that maniacal action is by Mr Mill
expressly defined as 'ruled by one motive with such absolute sway,
that there is no room for the influence of any other,' and as so ruled,
'uncontrollable.' Sane action, again, is action the causes of which
are controllable ; action not so raled by a motive but that ' there is
room for the influence of other motives.' But this, from Mill's point
of view, I take leave to consider nonsense. How possibly, within
the sphere of Causation, could there be room for any motives other
than those causally efiicient (in which, of course, we include those
present, though — in a loose sense — mon-eifieient), by which the action
was determined, and determined — except as we intrude these other
motives — uncontrollably f If, as Mr Mill implies, this character of
uncontroUableness, as being ' ruled by a motive leaving room for the
influence of no other ' be the sign of insane action, it seems plain, that
for any consistent Causationist, sane action is in no respect to be
distinguished from it, as equally partaking of this character.

Contimied. 1 09

as in every moral regard identical with the homicidal
maniac. And what is true of this extreme case must
of course equally be true in cases less extreme; for
as Mr Mill has well told us, 'there cannot be one
' theory for one kind of voluntary actions, and another
' theory for another kind.' Consequently, for no bad
action whatever, ' unconditionally determined as if it
were a phenomenon of dead matter,' is a man more
morally responsible than if he were urged to it by
'maniacal impulse ! That this view, in which for our
evil actions we are no more hlamabU than maniacs,
is 'sufficient for the ends of society,' may in some
sense be admitted ; for the man, though not morally
responsible, Society, for its own ends, may malce, if it
will, responsible, and hang him out of hand, or, failing
that, shut him up. How, as Mr MiU alleges, it is also
' sufficient for the individual conscience,' self-approving
or self-condemning, I meantime fail to discern.

As to the other kind of man, all whose actions are
supposed ' from the beginning of things unconditionally
determined to good, like phenomena of dead matter,'
he might as well be a dead man at once, phUanthropi-
cally set at work by a stimulus from galvanic batteries
cunningly brought to bear upon him,^ for any moral

1 Let .me utilise this suggestion a little. Suppose the resources of
Science capable of such a thing— a corpse heing furnished to us, by
cunning ^applications of galvanism, we can so stimulate it that life is
exactly simulated, and it goes about performing good and bad actions
at the will of the scientific gentleman who works it from behind the
scenes. Mr Mill would, I suppose, admit, that not the poor corpse-
puppet, but the scientific operator, was to be blamed if it committed

1 1 o Illustration in an easy Way.

quality, rationally to his actions attributable. In
speaking of 'encouragement' to such a man, surely
Mr Mill speaks idly ; in regard of such a man utterly
incapable of lapse, encouragement and temptation alike
are seen to have no meaning. There could be no sense
in encouraging him, except, perhaps, ■pour encourager
les autres less happily and abnormally constituted.
That he might be an object of esteem, I admit ; but the
esteem would, I apprehend, be of a negative, and not
very vividly moral kind, like that which we accord to
sheep, on the ground that they are good enough not to
turn tigers upon us. To illustrate this matter in an
easy way, let me suppose the advent of some wonderful
billiard-player, who invariably, on taking up his cue,
proceeded to make his game off the balls ; under whose
charming hand the balls, as if bewitched, perpetually
either cannoned, or softly subsided in the pocket ; who,
let him try what hopeless stroke he would, was never
known to fail to score ! Certainly he would flutter a
little, at first, the Volsces of the sporting circles ; his

murder ; to be praised if it carried a good Irish Bill through Parlia-
ment. And suppose that Science could go further, and bestomng life
and consciousness, could now produce the very same actions, not
directly, but through a medium of emotion generated— 'love of good
or love of self and indifference to good,' does Mr Mill really suppose
the state of the case thus altered ? Plainly it is not the least so ; the
scientific operator is still the real agent— the apparent agent merely
his puppet, in regard of whom moral judgments can have clearly no
manner of relevancy. And between such a galvanised puppet and
Mr Mill's supposed man, whose acts are ' unconditionally determined
' from the beginning of things as if they were phenomena of dead
'matter,' no moral distinction can ever possibly be substantiated
Vide as to this. Note on Hume. — (Appendix, Note III.)

Ilhistration in an easy Way. 1 1 1

skill would be reckoned a marvel. But suppose it
came presently to be known that all this took place by
a mysterious law of nature as constant as that of gravi-
tation; that, let him play as wildly, aimlessly, reck-
lessly as he would, the man was, under this strange law,
absolutely necessitated to score. The man would still
be recognised as a marvellous billiard-playing product
of nature; but should we ever more hear tell of his
skill? Pretty plainly, -not; some lurking possibility
of failure is essential to the very notion. One would
not peril a serious argument on an analogy so off-hand
as this ; but it seems to me that in the moral sphere,
the case is not essentially otherwise. There, also, some
distinct possibility oi failure is the necessary condition
of any merit, to be rationally attributed to success. Easy
indeed to throw sixes any number of times in succession,
if you are allowed first to load your dice. A man
such as Mr Mill here supposes, unconditionally deter-
mined in every case to good, as inevitably as a stone is
to the ground, would be, so to speak, playing with dice
which he had previously got loaded to suit him. No
thanks to him for throwing his virtuous sixes any
number of times successively. ISTot the less, should his
sixes be from time to time thrown to me, in the form
of £60 cheques, I should make it a point to regard him
with some degree of ' esteem and affection.' Primarily,
my esteem and affection would be directed rather to
the cheques than the man, and only to the man as
' associated ' with them ; but in time — there is no say-
ing — an ' inseparable association ' might be established ;

I 1 2 Necessitarians not necessarily Scoundrels.

and the affection -which I had rationally entertained
for his cheques, I might afterwards transfer to the
man. I should no whit the le,ss, in doing so, be a
merely hallucinated blockhead ; the man would no whit
the more, in throwing his inevitable sixes, be proved
to be morally meritorious. In having gradually come
to so consider him, under the ' law of inseparable
association,' I should simply have been befooled by
that law ; a misfortune from which so sagacious a
person as Mr Mill has not always contrived to escape.-'
As to Mr Mill's concluding sentence, — " And no com-
petently informed person wUl deny, that, as a matter
of fact, those who have held this creed, have had as
strong a feeling, both emotional and practical, of moral
distinctions, as any other people" — I should suppose
that what he says in it may be quite true ; were it not
indeed, that, as believing he can help his actions, he is
not the unconditional Causationist he thinks he is, Mr
Mill himself, in virtue of the noble ethical fervour
which glows in very much of his writing, might very
well serve as an instance to illustrate his own position
here. But what if it be to the full, as Mr MiU says ?
It is worthless for any purpose of his argument. Sup-

1 I do not myself see tliat, from the point of view indicated, these
arguments can well be answered. By changing the point of view, it
might be quite possible to develop the paradox from them, that the
more virtuous a man is, the less virtuous, in the sense of havin" merit
attributed to him ; the more vicious the less vicious, in the sense of
being subject of blame. This would not, however, any whit invali-
date the demonstration that on the Necessitarian hypothesis merit
demerit, praise, blame, desert, &c., are words with no rational
significance.

Reasons why. 1 1 3

pose that up to the age of five-and-twenty, a man,
without much troubling his head, about them, has, in
Butler's phrase, 'kept to his natural sense of things;'
has never expressly cared to think of questions of
Liberty or Necessity ; and as to his moral convictions,
has accepted them simply as they came to him, possibly
with much earnestness. Somehow, he is led to think of
this vexed matter, and — no shame to him on the ground
of logic — is convinced by the crushing force of the Neces-
sitarian argument. He accepts the doctrine of Necessity,
and scouts the idea of Freedom ; yet continues, just
as before he did, to believe in Moral Eesponsibility
or the reality of moral distinctions. This may very
well be on several grounds. For it is just possible he
may as little as Mr Mill, understand the doctrine he
professes, and, scouting the idea of Freedom, may all
the while firmly believe in it ; or not 'believing in it,
he may yet have a feeling or instinct of Freedom— a
feeling that he can help doing as he does — which clings
to him, and is unawares regulative of his feelings
otherwise ; or finally, his moral convictions being no
less precious to him on the one hand, than his ' specu-
lative dogma ' on the other, in his determination to
keep to lotli, he may have thought out the relations
between them in a quite loose and irresolute way, and
as trimmer between Freedom and Fate, have invented
for himself some such via Tnedia of utterly illogical
compromise as we have seen Mr Mill take up with in
his ' Doctrine of Moral Causation.'

And, further, if we suppose that, as a bolder logician,

H

114 Mr Mill versus Berkeley again.

he has resolutely pressed the line of argument which
leads him to admit such antagonism between the doc-
trine of Necessity and the moral nature of man, that
holding, as he does to the first, he must logically reject
the other ; what is proved by the fact that his ' prac-
tical feeling' in the matter of moral distinctions remains
precisely as it was ? That the reasonings were fcdse
by which, speculatively, he was led to reject them?
Surely, nay. All that seems really proved is, that a
' speculative dogma ' accepted, has failed — as indeed
we should expect — to extirpate a 'practical feeling,'
founded on education, original instinct, or what you
will, and worked into the very fibre of the mind by the
associations of a whole quarter of a century. Does
Mr Mill, of all men, need to be reminded that such
rooted habits of feeling could only yield, if at all, with
the utmost slowness, and as ' counter-associations might
be formed ' ? i Of what importance then is it to
allege the persistence of the practical feeling as
opposed to the speculative conclusion? Here, once
more, in effect, Mr Mill, emulous of Dr Johnson,
despised as ' a man of much over-rated ability,' ^ is
seen vigorously kicking a stone with his foot, and
considering he triumphs over Berkeley. At this rate,
people will begin to suspect that Dr Johnson is by no

' Is it necessary to note here that no coimter-associations could in
such case be formed, by comparison, of any potency ?

2 Somewhere in Mr Mill's Logic. I liave not cared to overhaul the
passage, the book not being at hand. [I have since sought to look
up the passage, and have failed to find it. Possibly it may have dis-
appeared from the later editions. ]

A n unfortunate Passage. 115

means the only man of eminence whose abilities have
been a little over- rated by the more ardent class of his
admirers.

A few words as to only one other little point, and I
dismiss this portion of the subject. In the little Essay
which Mr Mill notices, I could not but comment with
some sharpness on Mr Mill's unfortunate passage,
which I must beg to be excused in once more quot-
ing : ' Yes ; if he really "could not help " acting as he
' did ; that is, if it did not depend on his will, if he
' was under physical constraint, or even if he was

under the action of such a violent motive that no
' fear of punishment could have any effect ; which, if

capable of being ascertained, is a just ground of
' exemption.' This passage is so plainly to Mr Mill,
as Causation] st, unpermitted, that it would have been
wisdom for him, on finding it objected to on grounds
not to be gainsaid,^ simply to have dropped it from his
book. It might then by a kindly critic have been
condoned, as merely one of the little inadvertencies
which the shrewdest thinker may at times lapse into
in sounding his difficult way through intricacies of
abstruse subject. As Mr Mill, however, has not only
reproduced the passage, but, by making a slight altera-
tion, has certified to us that his deliberate attention has
been given to it, he has formally erected a cross, on
which he now hangs a crucified impenitent, and from

1 On grounds not to be gainsaid. So, at least, it seems to myself.
For the reader, who may possibly adjudge otherwise, I quote the
passage in the Appendix. — See l^ote IV.

1 1 6 Mr Mill, as effacing a Hostile Criticism.

which the good offices of all the kind critics in the
world will scarce avail to take him down. Originally,
the passage stood thus : ' If he really "could not help "
' acting as he did ; that is, if his Will could not have
' helped it.' This he now changes into ' that is — if it
did not depend on his will ; ' and this is, I suppose,
one of the passages alluded to in his Preface, in which
' a slight modification in a sentence, or even in a phrase,
' which a person acquainted with the former editions
' might read without observing it, and of which, even
' if he observed it, he would most likely not perceive
' the purpose, has sometimes effaced many pages of
' hostile criticism.' By changing the turn of his phrase
here, Mr Mill does succeed in evading the point of a
page or two of light banter, to which I presumed to
treat him, not perhaps in its flippancy of tone alto-
gether to be held becoming, any more than certain
occasional levities of the like kind which disfigure the
present performance. Does he thus evade the point of
the criticism — led up to by these little objectionable
gaieties — that by ivill here he must needs mean nothing
but that i^ree- will, ' in virtue of which only could a
man in any case " have he^oed " his act, as Mr Mill
here plainly implies that in most cases he could ' ?
Plainly, he does not in the least evade it, his passage
remaining as before, an implicit assertion of Freedom,
expressly in his doctrine denied. Further — ' if it did
' not depend on his will ; if he was under the action
' of such a violent motive that no fear of punishment
' could have any effect, which, if capable of being as-

Effacing a Hostile Criticism. 1 1 7

' certained, is a just ground of exemption.' That in
every case in which the fear of punishment has no
effect, it couli, have had none, is, from the point
of view of the Causationist, so entirely ' capable of
being ascertained,' that any Causationist maintaining
it could have had, is self-constituted no Causationist,
but simply as to this matter, one of the bewildered
of the earth, who does not the least know what he is.
If the fear of punishment liad no effect, it is plain it
only could have had effect by being a stronger fear ;
and to suppose it so, is to suppose ' that change in
' the antecedents, which Mr Mill himself has taught
' us to exclude.' Consequently, in emry case in which
a deterring motive lias no effect ; that is, in every case
of crime supposable, there is 'just ground of exemp-
tion.' From tMs — in my former criticism pressed upon
Mr Mill, as logically involved in his deliverance here
— is there anything in his new turn of phrase devised
to • efface hostile criticism,' in the least to facilitate his
escape ? I cannot, for my own part, see it so.

Furthermore — ' if it did not depend on his will ; if
' he was under the influence of such a violent motive,
' that no fear of punishment could have any effect ; '
that no counter-motive could avail against it ! In tliis,
Mr Mill may be held to have reached at last his ne
plus ultra of absurdity. It amounts to a distinct an-
nouncement, that no action in which a strong motive
overpowers a weaker one, ' depends on the will^ or is
voluntary; that no actions are, in point of fact, vol-
untary, except, perhaps, those which are mvoluntary.

1 1 8 Bettei^ for Mr Mill to have admitted it.

Hideously disastrous for Mr Mill as his — ' If liis will
could not have helped it,' was shown to be, it did not,
on the face of it, involve him in anything so absolutely
dreadful as this ! Better for him to have frankly ac-
cepted and admitted my ' hostile criticism,' than thus
have sought to ' efface ' it by a ' modification of phrase,'
by which, from one depth of absurdity he is plunged
into yet a deeper one.

Conscioicsness of Freedom. 119

SUPPLEMENTAEY.

Whatevee be the force of the argument, merely
logical, which, as proving the Causation of actions, is
held to invalidate human Freedom — and it seems to
me so altogether crusliing that I am surprised any crea-
ture with ' discourse of reason at all should seek for
an instant to evade it — it seems not the less likely that
whilst the world lasts, and humanity remains as it is,
said human Freedom will always have a good deal to
say for itself. Some thousand years or so hence, when
the John Stuart MUl of the period has triumphantly
demonstrated it ' a figment,' and declined to admit it
in consciousness, his critics wiU. probably be able to
prove to him from some passage inadvertently indi-
cative of his true feeling in the matter, that — figment
as he has cleverly shown it to be — he himself retains a
thorough belief in it. That doing so, he could yet have
helped doing so, or done otherwise, is, as we have seen,
Mr Mill's assured conviction ; and it is a conviction, I
believe, which he will be found to share with every
sane man, who, dismissing for the moment his theories.

I20 Consciotisness of Freedom.

will candidly tell us how he truly feels in the matter.
If there be any man who feels otherwise, and is prac-
tically and clearly convinced he can in nothing luVp
doing as he does, be it for good or evil, I should at
least not advise him to allege his inability as an ex-
cuse before his fellow-men, of whatever may be amiss
in his conduct ; for it is certain it will not be listened
to, or admitted, except for a maniac. But in point of
fact, no man ever dreams of alleging in excuse of his
voluntary actions the plea of inability to 'help them,
which is admitted when the will is in abeyance to a
clearly made out compulsion. And if a belief or con-
viction of which we are thais unable to get rid, even
when we have reasoned it away, be not, on the expellas
furca recurret principle, to be accepted, as a genuine
belief naturas} or datum of human consciousness, I
know not where we should look for such.

There seemed always considerable force in Clarke's
way of putting it, that ' all our actions do now in ex-
' perience seem to us to be free, exactly in the same
' manner, as they would do, upon supposition of our
' being really Free Agents,' — that in fact— freedom as-
sumed — the evidence of consciousness in its favour.

1 Our belief in the external world, it may be urged, is precisely in
the same sense, a Natural belief ; we cannot get rid of it, even when
we have reasoned it away. Yet Mr Mill not only regards it as illu-
sory, hut is ready with his 'Psychological Theory,' which constructs
the Illusion as such, out of primary elements of experience. And if
out of elements of experience he can similarly educe the idea of Free-
dom, it is admitted he will do something to discredit it as an article
of Natural Belief. Of this hereafter (see p. 124-128).

Consciottsness of Freedom. 1 2 1

could by no possibility have been stronger than it now
is, in the very minds — as instance that of Mr Mill —
by which it is most strenuously denied. He very well
goes on to say that ' this does not indeed amount to a
' strict Demonstration of our being free ; ' and if he
had said it did not amount to anj"- demonstration at all,
strict or unstrict, perhaps his own strictness would
have been greater. What follows is in some sense re-
markable enough— seeing how perseveringly the plea
put forth in it, as fundamental to his whole Philosophy,
was afterwards urged by Hamilton — to deserve quota-
tion in an argument originating in Mr Mill's consider-
ation of his claims. It is not, he admits, a Demon-
stration ; ' yet it leaves on the other side of the ques-
' tion nothing but a bare Possibility of our heing so
' framed hy the author of Nature, as to he ^unavoidably
' deceived in this matter hy every Experience of every
' action we perform.' There is nothing, however, here
to which a determined and thorough-going antagonist
needs find any difficulty in replying. The bare possi-
bility by Clarke admitted, is strictly all that is needed
by the sceptic, as ground of bis negative reasonings ;
and to what Mr Mill caUs Hamilton's ' tiresome plea '
here anticipated by Clarke^ — ' is then the root of our
Nature a lie? the Deity therein a deceiver?' — he may
answer, with entire composure, that perhaps it is really
so; that he sees no very good reason, why not, and
win be glad if from his own clear personal knowledge

1 And Clarke, in his turn, is somewhere anticipated by Descartes
unless my memory deceives me.

122 Consciousness of Freedom.

of the Deity, his opponent will be good enough to
furnish him with one. To a gentleman prepared, as he
ought to be, from his point of view of the Sceptic, to
quite coolly go this length, it will not be easy to reply.^
He is perfectly willing to admit Freedom as given in
consciousness ; but denies that its being so given is
any guarantee of its reality. And if nowhere else he
asserts such a guarantee ; and not in the least stag-
gered at being told that Science itself is thus reduced
to incertitude, announces that for aught we can ever
know, the whole world and life of man is simply a
' shadow- system ' of cunningly- devised illusions, his
position seems pretty impregnable.

Mr Mill, however, does not go quite this length,
admitting throughout in consciousness, supposed
genuine, a basis of reality and certitude. And it
is alleged that for the fact of Freedom, — admitted
on the ground of logic inexplicable — we have, this
indefeasible guarantee of consciottsness. This Mr
Mill, it is plain, in the most resolute manner would
deny, even whilst admitting — as in fact, when the

^ In order to get at the Deity by way of proof or otherwise, the
veracity of Consciousness and Keason must be assumed. How then
can we legitimately make use of the Deity to prove the veracity of
Consciousness? F"iiZc Mr Mill (p. 161-163). Tirfe, as to this, Hume —
" Essay on the Academical or Sceptical Philosophy : " " To have re-
course to the Supreme Being, in order to prove the veracity of our
senses, is surely making a very unexpected circuit. If His veracity
were at all concerned in this matter, our senses would be entirely in-
fallible, because it is not possible He can ever deceive. Not to men-
tion, that, if the external world be once called in question, we shall
be at a loss to find arguments by which we may prove the existence
of that Being, or any of His attributes."

Cojtsciousness Developed and Primitive. 123

thing is pressed upon him (as at p. 35), he cannot
possibly help doing — that of Freedom, he has, like
Hodge and others, a practical feeling or conviction.
I am ' convinced ' — he would say — or ' aware — I will
not say conscious' (see ante, p. 33), having, it seems, a
faculty peculiar to himself, of being most sharply
convinced, and aware of things, yet all the while pro-
foundly unconscious of them. In effect, he would be
sure to say that, admitting Freedom — as he must and
does — in what I may call developed consciousness, that
' familiar and intimate knowledge ^ concerning our-
' selves which there is no appropriate scientific name
'for' (p. 566, 3d ed.), he denies it in the prifnitive
consciousness, to which only he attributes scientific
validity. But, this position assumed, Mr Mill is
bound to exhibit the process, whereby, no germ of it
being given in primitive consciousness, the feeling of
Freedom becomes ' developed,' as we afterwards , find
it in the mature consciousness which, in order to meet
Mr Mill, I am willing to call ' conviction.' And, in
any attempt to exhibit this process, Mr Mill's failure
would almost certainly be signal. Mr Mill's grand
test of a datum of primitive consciousness — for him
an extremely convenient one — is, that it should be
shown to be present in the mind of an infant at the
instant of birth. No more than of anything else, can

^ If we are to be very strict with Mr Mill, it may be noted that in
using the word knowledge here he really gives up his case ; knowledge
— in so far as it really is so — involving the reality of the thing
known ; whilst from belief, on the other hand, there is no inference
whatever of the reality of the thing believed.

124 Pti'Tsuit of Knowledge 2inder Difficulties.

this be demoustrated of Freedom.^ And in fact, I
have elsewhere noted it of children, as 'not a little
' curious that the earliest utterances of these small
' philosophers are in favour of Mr Mill's doctrine of
' Necessity.' In the fact familiar to every one in the
least familiar with children, that constantly — and

^ And supposing it cmild be demonstrated — a miraculous babe being
got whose consciousness, at the instant of birth, was found, on its
being catechised, to include Freedom, or anything else obnoxious to
Mr Mill's theories ? We should just be where we were. Mr Mill is
too clever a general, in taking up a position, not to carefully secure his
line of retreat. Does any one doubt that in such a case as that sup-
posed, Mr Mill would for an instant hesitate to remand us to the
mother's womb, and to some supposed round of ante-iudal experiences,
which, with a little help from Association and so on, would perfectly
well serve his turn ? Of course we could not foUow Mr Mill there !'
Psychology, as conceived by Mr Mill, is certainly a pursuit of Know-
ledge under difiBculties. This seems but idle fleering, and yet is not
wholly so. The child before birth would be quite as legitimate an ally
in argument for Mr Mill, as the child at the instant of it ; and not
any whit more ludicrous. In all this of Mr Mill about the con-
sciousness of an infant at the instant of birth, if we could get at it,
being decisive, &apure, in distinction from subsequent consciousness
which includes elements of experience, there seems nothing but mis-
conception. Mr Mill, as we shall see (p. 154), does not seem to be
aware of a fact so simple as this, that Consciousness and Experience
are, in point of fact, convertible terms. Experience being only pos-
sible through Consciousness, and the first fact of Consciousness being
also the first of Experience. He seems also at times to forget, what
of course he must very well know, that in order to Experience there
must first be a creature to have it, by whose outfit of connate
capacities, as in ordered sequence developed, the character and con-
tent of the Experience are rigorously throughout determined. Not
unfrequently, as the vowed Apostle of Experience, the divine Ori-
ginal of everything, Mr Mill almost seems to write, as if given the
Experience called Vision, he could create from it the seeing Eye.
But surely to begin with the Eye and thence proceed to the Vision
seems much the more natural order.

Mr Mill's Experience Argument. 125

this ia obvious passionate hona fides — for acts whicli
are plainly voluntary, they will allege in excuse the
' I could not help it/ which in later life nobody would
dream of alleging unless wishing to be held a maniac,
I have said that 'the force and obviousness of the
' argument, "derived from the experienced sequences
' of impulse and act, receives perhaps the strongest
' illustration of which it seems capable.' The ques-
tion before Mr Mill is this — how comes it that the
child, at this stage an orthodox Causationist Philo-
sopher — rather more so than we have seen Mr Mill
himself — is afterwards debauched into the heresy of
believing itself /ree, and able to Ae/p i^^ actions ? It
does not seem much to attest the conclusiveness of
Mr Mill's 'Experience argument,' — the total facts
being taken — that satisfying the infant in coats, it is
despised and rejected by the boy who has intelligently
progressed into knickerbockers. Wlience this dissat-
isfaction of the boy with the wisdom of Mr Mill,
which perfectly sufficed him as an infant ? Mr Mill
is desired to deduce it for us, and one is curious as
to how he will proceed. If he succeeds in dediicing it
at all, it must be from some new fount of illumination,
for it is certain it cannot come from the old one.
The ' Experience ' which suggested to the babe that —
in its poor little trembling phrase — it ' could not help
it,' can scarcely, by dint of being constantly repeated,
suggest to the boy that he could. Mr Mill, who makes
elsewhere so much use of the implement of ' Experience
and inseparable Association,' is invited to employ it

126 Mr Mill's Experience Argument.

lien. Doing so, he will inevitably be forced to admit,
that — Experience thus early suggesting Necessity,^ — as
cumulative in what he calls the ' collective experience
of life,' it must needs have so deepened this suggestion,
' as streams their channels deeper wear,' as utterly to
preclude the emergence at an after period of a feeling
of Freedom opposed to it. The feeling of Freedom,
therefore, which Mr Mill would fain deny, but cannot,
is thus shown to emerge, despite, of that law of ' Expe-
rience and inseparable Association' which Mr Mill
holds to be the most energetic factor of belief How,
on these terms, it could ever succeed in emerging, ex-
cept as what Mr Mill denies it to be, e«^ra-experiential
and in the true sense — as distinct from his palpably
absurd one — a primitive datum of consciousness, Mr
Mill is requested to explain. And the explanation, in
order to be reasonably satisfactory to Mr MUl himself,
must be clear and cogent indeed, seeing it has the
whole weight of his own favourite law to contend
against.

The only explanation I can conceive tendered is that
developed at page 24 from Hume's bint, that ' the Will
' moves easily every way, and produces an image of
' itself (or a Velleity, as it is called in the schools) even

1 Tlioiigh this sense of Necessity in the child, as expressed in its
' could not help it,' seems sufficiently curious to be noted, it is not of
course in the least essential to the argument here. Apart from all
question of the child, the question for Mr Mill remains, Whence this
feeling of Freedom, of a power in us to lidii our actions, the ' collec-
tive experience of life,' from its first to its last hour, giving, as Mr
Mill expressly asserts, evidence dead the other way ?

Genesis of Freedom in Consciotcsness. 127

' on that side on whicli it did not settle.' But though
not without a certain superficial plausibility, I scarcely
think it approves itself on anything like a close exami-
nation. In the fact that the WiU, in its moving hither
and thither, in the process of deliberation, produces in
its every movement ' an image of itself, or Velleity,'
nothing is really explained, unless the necessity be also
explained under which we are unavoidably led to
potentiate the image, so to speak, and attribute to the
so-called Velleity a vital reality as will ; nor, unless
this necessity — universal as we find its operation — be
admitted a fundamental necessity of human reason,
would it the least avail for Mr Mill's purpose. Were it
anything short of this, Mr MlU's law of ' Experience
and inseparable Association' would inevitably, with
much ease, dispose of it. If Mr Mill declines to admit
this, he lies open to some suspicion of being willing,
for the purpose of his argument, to make little here of
the law, of which elseivhere he makes so much ; de-
grading from its place of potency, as it suits him, an
agency which it suited him before, and presently will
suit him again, to regard as wellnigh omnipotent. The
mental law, therefore, by which unavoidably we attri-
bute to the so-called VeUeity the vital power of the
will, is shown — as against Mr Mill — to be a funda-
mental necessity or law of reason ; and it is submitted
that, as such, it is vain to seek to invalidate it by
reason, in any of its subsequent operations, of what
logical rigour soever ; and that the fact is really so,
will, I trust, appear as we proceed. The result of the

128 Genesis of Freedom.

whole is, that meantime — and pending such other ex-
planation or genesis'^ of the feeling as Mr Mill may have
to offer — he seems bound to admit in Preedom a
genuine fact of human Consciousness, which amounts
to his acceptance of it in lelief. And this further
result seems reached, that the only tenable attitude
possible to any one denying Freedom, is that of the
thorough-going sceptical gentleman before glanced at,
who, denying the authority of consciousness, does not
very confidently assert anything, but enthrones on the
ruins of all Eeality the spectre of universal Illusion.
To this gentleman, it is admitted, no distinct reply is
to be offered.^

Eestricting the view a little, it seems certain that
whatever else on the denial of Freedom may lapse into
the category of Illusion, Moral distinctions must, and
the Moral Eesponsibility of man. Not only on such a

[1 The challenge here thrown out to Mr Mill, lias since been ac-
cepted by Mr Sully in the Essay to which I have already made ref-
erence in Appendix, Note I. (not of course that I think it likely Mr
Sully ever read a word I have written). A few very brief remarks on
his Paper, considered in this regard, as before 1 remarked on it in
another, I include in Appendix, Note V.]

^ Eeally none that I know of, except Hamilton's, neatly enough
summed by Mr Mill in saying that the Sceptic of this kind, ' in deny-
ing all knowledge denies none. ' To which probably the Sceptic would
reply that he denies none ; that asserting nothing, he is not so incon-
sequent as to deny, denial being itself a mode of assertion. He simply
doubts all. This, as Hamilton says, is to doubt that he doubts.
Vide Don Jvan : —

' So little do we know what we're about in
This world, I doubt, if doubt itself be doubting.'

By this doubt he is remanded to knowledge, whence he instantly
proceeds to resolve himself into doubt again — and so on.

Thorough. 129

view are they sceptically dissolved, as unable to show
rational basis for themselves, but the argument against
them is good to ground their dogmatic negation.
Every attempt hitherto — as vide Hume's (Appendix),
and now that of Mr Mill — to harmonise with the scheme
of unconditional Causation or Necessity, the moral
nature of man, in virtue of which we hold him culpable
in his evil actions (cxilpable as distinct from merely
punisJiable), has resulted in helpless failure. But here,
once more, if a man is quite thorough-going in his
reasoning ; and while denying neither Freedom, nor
Morality, as facts of universal human Consciousness,
develops the argument from Causation which seems to
shatter the one, boldly presses it to its speculative re-
sult in the virtual extinction of the other, and declines to
sacrifice these clear deductions of his Eeason to what
he can only regard as mere blind irrational beliefs,
of which — except indeed as they are ' natural ' — no
account is to be given, I see not how he is to be
answered, save only by answering his reasonings, which
no one will ever be able to do. A Belief, were it thrice
over ' Natural,' proves nothing beyond itself as a fact of
Nature or life ; it can never in the least avouch to us
the reality of the thing believed ; and surely beliefs —
it may be urged — how sacred and important soever,
are to be held somewhat in evil case, when, as here,
we can only continue to cling to them in express defi-
ance of Eeason. Such beliefs, if ' natural,' as they are
said to'be, may always, on that ground, be trusted to
maintain their practical efficiency ; but, not the less,
I

1 30 Tkorotcgk.

are speculatively to be rejected as absurd. And it is
really, after all, no answer to this scepticism, to allege
that it carries in it a germ of the further scepticism
which assails the very bases of human knowledge.
This may or may not be— the Sceptic may reasonably
answer — meantime, be good enough to deal with my
argument on its own ground ; if any flaws exist in it,
I suppose them capable of being exhibited ; failing to
exhibit any such, you are bound to admit my conclu-
sions. And thus far and provisionally, I must admit
myself at one with the Sceptic.^ But should it be found
that all the while, the Eeason, in which — within the
limits by reason itself prescribed — he surely does well
to trust, is being exercised beyond these limits, and
in a region in which its impotence is self-confessed,
in that case it seems open to us to admit the whole
force of his argument, and yet demur to his conclusion.
And precisely thus it will be found.

^ Though hitherto representing the supposed Necessitarian as
accepting tlie position of extreme scepticism, on which, in virtue of
his denial as truth, of an admitted datum of consciousness, it is the
aim of the dogmatist to thrust him, I do not in the least see that in
strictness he is hound to accept it. There is consciousness — he might
say — and consciousness ; I call in question no data of consciousness
save such as I have shown to contradict the scientific Reason. My
argument to that effect is before you ; if you cannot aiiswer, in vain
do you seek to evade it, by telling me I ought not, as denying the
authority of consciousness, to be certain even of such a thing as that
two and two make four. Produce, in your turn, the series of accurate
reasonings by which that proposition is invalidated ; having done so,
and found that I, in my turn, am unable to furnish you with an
answer to them , you will then, I admit, be entitled, from my^uestion-
ing the authority of consciousness in certain of its data, to press me to
question its authority in all. But not, as I think, till then.

Freedom in a bad way. 131

The attempt to explain Freedom ; to include it in
the forms of the human understanding hy effecting
its logical reconcilement with the law of Universal
Causation, is now, I should imagine, pretty well aban-
doned as hopeless. Again, to deny the Universality
of the Law, by excluding from it human actions, in
order to maintain their freedom, is somewhat too des-
perate an expedient, and amounts to intellectual
suicide. A tenet which can only be defended by
announcing a proposition so plainly absurd as this —
that when a man eats, it is not because he is hungry
or for any other reason known to him — had best at
once be given up. The argument in terro7'em — so to
call it — from moral results of doctrine, is scarcely
entitled to the name ; and in any case can always
be disposed of by coolly accepting the results, and re-
questing the opponent to disprove the reasonings by
which they are reached. The evidence of Conscious-
ness is precarious — it may be said — and ought not to
be received, when it can be shown to contradict any
clear deduction of reason. With the retort upon the
sceptic that hej-e rejecting the evidence of conscious-
ness, he must also reject it elseivhere, and announce
the reductio ad ahsurdum of doubt, which confounds
all knowledge whatever, he may — as we have seen —
very well decline to concern himself, till such time as
a reasoned argument is set before him to the effect
that two and two can by no possibility make four —
an argument equal in force to his own which demon-
strates the inconsequence of the belief in Freedom.

132 Something, however, to be said for it.

And as this is not likely soon to be done, it might
almost seem that Freedom, as an article of belief, is
a little in a bad way. And so indeed, it must be,
so long as the argument is pursued on the mere ground
of the logical understanding. But if reason good can
be shown for discrediting the competence of the logical
understanding to treat authoritatively of such a subject,
in its very nature seen to transcend logic, as soaring
or sinking into the region of aboriginal mystery, the
' final inexplicability, at which, as Sir W. Hamilton
' observes, we inevitably arrive when we reach ultimate
' facts ' {Mill, p. 242), the aspect of the case seems
altered a little ; and we may find ourselves in a position
to reassert the integrity of consciousness, vindicate
Freedom as given in it, along with Moral Responsi-
bility ; and even, if the logical argument against these
be still dogmatically pressed, to retort with effect on
the opponent the charge of being wildly illogical, so
confidently hurled at all believers in at least the
-article of Freedom.^

In identifying the Will with the human personality

1 The stricter kind of reader may be apt to suspect confusion at
some points of the above, as in fact to some trivial extent there is
perhaps. It seems admitted, in parts, that the belief in Freedom is
held ' in defiance of Reason,' and though ' contradicted ' by it. This
is only, however, meant to be provisionally admitted, from the point
of view of the opponent. It will be seen that there is no contradic-
tion ; that the only Reason defied and contradicted is Reason falsely
so called— a Logic at once narrow and arrogant, which constitutes
itself the measure of Possibility, and dogmatically implies the pro-
position, that whatever is by its processes inex]pUcahU, is therein
branded as needs untrue and absurd.

Will and Personality identical. 133

— and this we must either decisively do, or exclude the
term from the discussion, on pain of rushing into
such dreadful confusions as those we have had occa-
sion to note in Mr Mill — we seem to carry the subject
into a region of thought, in which the mere Logician
is as helplessly baffled as a bird would be, let loose
in an impalpable ether.

' Waving Ms pennons vain, plump down he drops.'

Is the Will of man free? is Man a free agent?
These are identical phrases ; and the Will can plainly
be nothing but a synonym of the Ego, or veritable
•persona of the man, as operative in his conscious act.
Is the fact of Personality denied ? this is the merest
extravagance and deliration of scepticism : is it sought
to be logically explained .? this is the absurdest, insane
pretension of reason, so called, • logical. In the Ego
we are face to face with a mystery, ever the more felt
to be inscrutable, the more profound is the effort of
abstraction, by which we strive to compass apprehen-
sion of it. Probably to only a few, and not even to
these, save in rare and favoured moments of vision, is
it given to look to any depth into the abyss of wonder
and awe, which here for the most part lies veiled from
us — so best perhaps — by what Professor Eerrier calls
' the law of familiarity.' Mr Carlyle has said of Music,
that it ' is a kind of inarticulate unfathomable speech,
' which leads us to the edge of the Infinite., and lets us
' for moments gaze into that.' ^ Foolishness as it must

^ Carlyle. — Hero- Worship ; Tho Poet as Hero.

134 The Will, as one with it, a Mystery.

needs be to a certain class of readers, this seems to
express with as much precision as may be, what one is
here ineffectually aiming at. To say that the questions
of the Divine and the Human Personality are properly
but forms of the same question, would be somewhat
a bold statement ; yet the one is, in truth, no more
incompreh&nsihle than the other ; nor will any merely
speculative difficulty which besets the mystery of a
Being, infinite, and yet as personal, only to be con-
ceived of under some form of human limitation, ever, I
believe, be matter of grave perplexity to any one who
in the least adequately appreciates the depth of that
other mystery with which, on the finite ground, he is
every instant in contact. The human personality
accepted, we must accept as utterly 'inexplicable;'
' Believe it ^ thou must ; widerstancl it thou canst not,'
remains for ever the formula under which we must
dispose of the Ego. And if what we calj the Will — as
it can be no otherwise — be simply the Ego, as it flashes
into conscious act, plainly, in virtue of this formula,
the topic of Freedom is one not to be dogmatically
dealt with under the forms of the understanding. The
Ego admitted utterly mysterious and inscrutable, the
property of Freedom attributed to it can scarce, in the
eye of Eeason, be held discredited, merely as also
mysterious. That in Locke's phrase, we ' see not the
' Way of it,' seems no insuperable objection, when it is
shown that in the very nature of the case, it is plainly
impossible we should. What sort of frantic Logic is it

1 Sartor Bssartus.

Groimds for Assertion of Freedom. 135

wLicTi, admitting a mystery, insists that it shall not be
mysterious ; accepts as a postulate the inexplicable ;
proceeds to lay down the law to it ; and brands as
wildly irrational so modest a caveat as this, that the
inexplicable cannot be explained, yet is not therefore
to be ,held incredible ?

■It is granted that were the Ego thrice over myste-
rious, unless on good ground shown, it is incompetent to
assign to it any special mysterious attribute. But the
grounds on which we assert for it the attribute of
Freedom are such as, if candidly weighed, it will not
be easy to gainsay. In the testimony of Consciousness,
or — if Mr Mill prefers it — universal, indefeasible con-
viction, we have really, as Clarke weU puts the matter,
all the proof of it we can conceive possible, the truth
of the thing being assumed — a proof indeed undemon-
strative, but not therefore to be set aside, demonstrative
proof being by the very nature of the case excluded.
Further, apart from a belief in Freedom — not as exclud-
ing Causation, but as somehow — -though how we know
not — coexisting with it in human action on terms of
reciprocal limitation ^ — we cannot on rational grounds

1 Vide Mill and Garlyle, p. 111. "Moreover, to say that K'ecessity
(Causation), as detennining human action, cannot be harmonised in
belief with Free-will, as in some sense and measure * se^-determining
it, is really no more than to say that Free-will is a mystery, as which
it is expressly announced.

* In some sense and measure. If we conceive of Freedom and Necessity as
mysteriously coexisting in the voluntary acts of rational creatures, it is plain
we can only so conceive of them in degrees and variable proportions. It would
l>e too palpable an outrage of reason to say that a man driven by a strong motive
is in his act as free as he who is the subject of a weaker one. On the other hand,

1 36 Something to be said on both Sides.

continue to attribute validity to our moral Nature. So
complete is the havoc, in this sphere involved in denial
of it, that, as we have seen, moral distinction is not
any longer to be substantiated between a sane man and
a maniac.^ Quite possibly, there is no such distinc-
tion; all such distinctions ??2 a?/ be illusory; and what
we call Conscience merely an idiot hallucination. But
this is an extreme view ; — and the balance of proba-
bility seems to incline the other way ; it does really
seem to be probable that sane men are not maniacs.
We have thus, in favour of human Freedom — though
still nothing to be called a demonstration — a distinct
additional probability ; and these two items of probable
proof — the only kind of proof which the nature of the

^ The physical distinction is of conrse clear ; the intellectual dis-
tinction also might readily enough be indicated in the different rela-
tions to motive — what is the moral distinction between a sane man and
a maniac ? I can imagine none save that stated, as we have seen, by
Mr Mill, of control over action in the one, and want of this power of
control in the other. And once for all, the power to control or help
our actions is — Freedom. Failing of this, all moral distinction is
obliterated between sane and insane action. — ( Vide p. 108.)

to say that a starving wretch is no more necessitated to eat than a man who sits
down to supper after dining heartily an hour or two before, is the same tiling
stated from the other side. That he is no more necessitated, speculatively, we
must assert ; for, as we have abundantly seen, it is the clearest deduction from
the law of Causation, as applied to them, that, in relation to acts induced, the
most absolutely tyrannous motive is precisely as the most absolutely tri\ial one,
each being the sufficient determining cause of an effect inevitable as determined.
But, practically, it is on all hands recognised that a strong motive necessitates,
and thus excuses action, as a weaker one does not. Wc must thus conceive Neces-
sity and Freedom to co-inhere in human action, as variable quantities reciprocally
limiting each other; so that, whilst every action is in some strict sense necessi-
tated, it is still in some such sense free, as permits us to ascribe to it a moral
quality. This is, of course, to logic absurd ; but, as a rough-working conception
ot a. mystery beyond logic, the trustful acceptance of which is indispensable to
a rational belief at once in the results of science and the validity of our moral
nature, perhaps it may pass for the nonce."

Something to be said on both Sides. 137

case admits of — seem suflScient to lalance the stringent
logical demonstration on the other side, which includes
the human volition with all else, under the one grand
law of Causation. Each line of proof seems, on its
own ground, good ; each seems convicted of impotence,
invading the territory of the other. The proof which
for Freedom may be held appropriate and sufficient, is
naught as against Causation, and might with quite
as good effect be employed to subvert a proposition
of Euclid ; the Logic which approves Causation,
pressing on to a denial of Freedom, vainly seeks to
soar into the heaven of pure ether, unpermitted to
its presumptuous wing. Had, indeed, the logical
demonstration succeeded in exhibiting Freedom as
an express contradictory of Causation, the case would
have been somewhat different ; we should then have
had to choose between one or other of the beliefs ; to
constitute ourselves on the one hand, intellectually
felo de se, as denying the causation of human actions,
or, on the other, in the denial of Freedom, maniacs,
no longer amenable to moral law. But it is not, I
suppose, pretended, — or if so, it is merely pretended —
that Freedom has thus been shown to be incredible,
as contradictory of a truth of Science ; that it is not
itself a demonstrable truth of Science is all that will
ever be shown ; and nobody now asserts it such. That
actions are caused, yet free ! in this there is no contra-
diction ; ^ the causation is admitted proved ; the free-

1 That actions are caused yet uncaused, determined yet xindeter-
mined — in this there is contradiction ; that actions are determined

1 38 Both to be believed.

dom admitted not proved — this is really all. If the
Causationist, having proved his side of the case,
asks with clamorous triumph — liow free ? he is quietly
answered by Tennyson,^ ' we know not how ;' by Locke,
that he ' sees not the way of it ; ' and may further, if
need be, be answered that ' the way of it ' is probably
one of the things which the angels desire to look into
and cannot. No one who understands but a little of the
subject would in the least be surprised to know that
at this very instant of time, the ' way of it,' supposing
it a truth, is a puzzle to the Angel Gabriel. Why then,
if attested to as by the evidence which seems appro-
priate — in point of fact the only evidence which the
nature of the case admits of — should it be held intel-
lectual sin in us, to profess a belief in Freedom ? Above
all, why should Mr MiU. hold it a sin in us, himself all
the while believing it, though shy of professing his
belief ? His invaluable ' Doctrine of Causation ' being
left to him as good as intact — the trivial inroad upon it
being that what was before ' unconditional Causation '
is now in the volitional sphere mysteriously conditioned,
or limited by Freedom, with no serious harm to it as
Causation — why should 'not Mr Mill accept the con-
yet self-determined — that man in his actions, is determined, ab extra,
or in effect, by causes, the iron series of which stretches back into the
past infinite, and yet in some sense and measure ah intra, by himself,
O'c freely — in this no one can allege contradiction, however impossible
it may he to explain the co-inherence in human action of the two
factors, and the terms of their reciprocal limitation.
1 " Our wills are ours, we know not how ;
Our wills are ours, to make them thine. "

— In Memoriam.

Mr Mill had quite as well believe both. 1 39

ciliatory wisdom of Hamilton, and taking Freedom with
Necessity (Causation), 'believe both and both in unison,'
even though ' this conciliation is of the things to be
believed, not understood,' seeing that only thus can we
compose the internecine strife indicated as otherwise
inevitable between the intellectual and the moral con-
stituents of our Nature ? Except that he did not seem
quite to catch Hamilton's wisdom, thinking plainly that
in ' conciliating ' two ' opposite philosophical opinions '
Sir William intended to deny one of them, there seems
really no reason why Mr Mill should not have accepted
it. 'That propositions which, as our intelligence is
' now constituted, obstinately remain irreconcilable,
' may yet somehow, beyond the sphere of that in-
' telligence, admit of being reconciled, seems no such
' extravagant proposition.' ^ I have read Mr Mill to
little purpose, if, considered as a simple proposition, —
apart from the special application of it — he would
scout it as the least extravagant. At page 150, we find
him censure an adversary for ' confounding two different
' things — the belief in contradictories, and the recogni-
' tion of positive truths which merely limit one another,
' but to what extent or at what points, we cannot yet
' determine.' Is perhaps Mr Mill himself, in regard of
Causation, as related to human Freedom, involved in
this very confusion ?

The line of reasoning here indicated, which seeks to
rescue Freedom from the logical ban pronounced on it
' Mill and Carlyle, p. 111.

140 Will and Personality.

as inexplicable, by the identification of the Will with
the mystery of the human personality, of which Logic
is utterly incompetent to treat, is of course only avail-
able, so long as this incompetence is admitted.^ And
it is not by all thinkers admitted ; for whilst nobody
recognising the reality of the Ego, has ever pretended
to ' explain ' it, as comprehensible on grounds of reason,
hardy speculators have now and then appeared, who
considered that the Ego, which reason could not explain,
it might competently decline to accredit, as yielding to
the sceptical analysis. With some glance at this ex-
treme position, I may fitly conclude the discussion.

The great name of Hume, who accepting the reason-
ing of Berkeley which attacked the reality of Matter,
proceeded to apply it to the Mind, evaporated as also
an illusion, is of course, above all others, associated

^ It was, if I mistake not, Coleridge, who first among us decisively
took this ground, and remanded the discussion to a sphere, in which
it might safely contemn the tyranny of the logical understanding.
There, as elsewhere, however, his reader is more or less bored by his
famous distinction between the Reason and the Understanding, which
never, at least in his hands, — whatever in those of Kant it may haVe
done, — seemed to attain anything like scientific precision. Since
Coleridge, it is to Professor Ferrier that the reader may be best re-
ferred for light upon this topic. In his Institutes of Metapliysic, it is
only casually glanced at ; but his early work. An Introduction to the
Philosophy of Consciousness, abounds with pregnant suggestion upon
it. This performance he was wont in his later time to pooh-pooh a
little, saying, as I have heard him do when asked why he had not
thought of reprinting it from BlacJcwood, that he had once or twice
thought of it, but could never quite convince himself it was altogether
worth the pains. It would have been pity if in editing his Philoso-
phical Remains his literary executors had not decided the matter
differently.

Hume no Nihilist. 141

with this extreme of speculation. It is, however, in
some distinct sense, unjustly so. I have said that such
a view is the mere extravagance and deliration of
Scepticism ; and there is evidence that by Hume him-
self it had come to be so considered. In his early
work it is — ' A Treatise of Human Nature ' — that this
wild; speculation is developed. The material of this
book, — ' which the author had projected before he left
' College, and which he wrote and published not long
' aftet,' — in later life, he ' cast anew ' in his Essays,
complaining of opponents, who 'have taken care to
' direct all their battering against that juvenile work
' which the author never acknowledged,' and desiring
that 'henceforth the following Pieces may alone
' be regarded as containing his philosophical senti-
' ments and principles.' And in these Pieces, which
contain the final and only authoritative digest of
Hume's views, no trace did he permit to remain of
that crude boyish speculation. From the JSTihihsm,
as it is termed, which in his youth he announced,
Hume must thus, in his maturity, be held to have
implicitly retired, as seeing that a scepticism so ex-
treme was discredited even as a sport of dialectic —
in which light not a little of what he retained may
with much plausibility be regarded. And a scepti-
cism by Hume discarded as untenable, subsequent
thinkers need scarcely have tried to reinstate. The
attempt has, however, been made ; and among eminent
writers now living, Professor Bain and Mr Mill are to
be noted, as not indisposed to assume the cast clothes

142 Cast Clothes of Hume

of Hume here. In his interesting discussion of the
question of 'Liberty and Necessity' (vide The Emo-
tions and the Will, p. 539-567) — a discussion in
much to be taken objection to, but nowhere at least
involved in the confusions which are rather, in Mr^
Mill's case, to be held the rule than the exception —
we find Professor Bain thus writing — ' " Self-deter-
'"mination" assumes something more than spon-
' taneity, having a lurking reference to some power
' behind the scenes, that cannot be stated under the
form of a specific motive or end. ... If self-deter-
' mination is held to imply something different from
' the operation of the motive forces of pleasurable
' and painful sensibility, coupled with the central
' spontaneity of the system, there is an imputation on
' the sufficiency of the common analysis of the mind.
' Emotion, Volition, and Intellect, as explained with
' full detail in the present work, must stiU leave a
' region unexplored. A fourth, or residual department,
' would need to be constituted, the department of

1 It must be said, however, that Professor Bain succeeds in escaping
from the confusions in which Mr Mill is entangled, mainly by the
easy method (also adopted by Hume — see Appendix) of evading the
essential diifioulty. His remarks on ' Moral Inability — the Offender's
Plea,' amount to a positive negation of Moral Responsibility, as dis-
tinct from Responsibility simple, or mere Punishment with a view
to conduct in the future, ' such as we iuiiict on a cur to teach it to
respect the carpet.' When expressly, in the next chapter, Moral
Responsibility falls to be treated of, it is discussed in the most
meagre and perfunctory way. Defining it as simple PunishaUlity,
Professor Bain, in the very few remarks he makes, writes exclusively
from the ler/al, and absolutely ignwes the moral point of view.

Seem to fit Mr Bain indifferently. 143

' "self" or Me-ation, and we should set about the
' investigation of the laws (or the anarchy) prevailing
' there, as in the three remaining branches.'

Precisely so ; rem acu tdigit ; here is the very kernel
of the matter. If there be truly a living subject, Mind
or Me (certainly, if we suppose it to exist, ' not to be
stated under the form of a specific motive or end '),
of which Emotion, VoKtion, Intellect, are mere states,
or modes of activity, we certainly demand a Me-ation
in addition to that so-called 'analysis of the mind,'
which concerns itself with these mere modes of its
manifestation. "Without this there is certainly an
' imputation on the sufficiency ' of the ' common ana-
lysis,' considered as an analysis of the mind, or Me.
A department of Me-ation would distinctly ' need to
be constituted,' in order to the exhaustiveness of the
inq^uiry; but as clearly it can never be constituted,
the Me being necessarily unable to get behind itself, 1
so to speak, the most exhaustive inquiry possible to
us 'must still leave a region unexplored,' in which
Freedom — who knows? — may have its home. This,
Professor Bain perfectly well sees; and by way of
getting rid of the difficulty, he quite coolly denies the
existence of the mind as anything but merely the
observed sum of its own states. 'The proper mean-
' ing of self can be nothing more than my corporeal
' existence, coupled with my sensations, thoughts,

^ ' Can I give a reason for that, beyond the circle of which I cannot
' go, without at the same time overstepping the limits of my own
' existence ? ' — Fichtb.

144 Shockingly ill, in fact.

' emotions, and volitions, supposing the classification
' exhaustive, and the sum of these in the past, pre-
' sent, and future.' But these states are observed
states — observed by the me as its own; states of
which r am conscious, and of which I am conscious
as mine — they are 'my corporeal existence, coupled
with my sensations,' &c. The Me is of necessity ad-
mitted in the very act of denying it. Without a per-
manent existence calling itself ' I,' how comes it that
these stray sensations, &c., in the past, present, and
future, are found to sum themselves in unity as mine ?
Further — ' I am not able to concede the existence of
' an inscrutable entity in the depths of one's being, to
' which the name I is to be distinctively applied, and
' not consisting of any bodily organ or function, or
' any one mental phenomenon that can be specified.
' We might as weU talk of a mineral as difi'erent from
' the sum of all its assignable properties. A piece of
' quartz is an aggregate of inertia, specific gravity,
' &c. &c. &c. The aggregate is the quartz' own self,
' essence, or whatever other designation marks it off
' from other materials.' One needs scarce offer serious
reply to this. Who that knew what he was about
would ever speak — as here Professor Bain implicitly
makes his opponents do — of something which he calls
his Being, and then of ' an inscrutable entity ' called
his self or /, distinct from that Being, and presumed
to be resident somewhere 'in the depths of it' ? Who
ever asked the Professor to ' concede ' anything so
preposterous as this ? Seems it not plain that a self

Shockingly. 145

or T is asserted, not as distinct from, but one with tlie
veritable Being of the man — an 'inscrutible entity'
indeed, yet not in Professor Bain's sense inscrutable,
as under some supposed necessity of being a denizen
of 'the depths of itsdf, and presumably excluded
from its surface. Similar is the confusion of object-
ing to a mind or Ego 'not consisting of any bodily
organ or function, or any one mental phenomenon.' An
Ego or mind which should ' consist of bodily organs '
— arms or legs, to wit, which can be cut off and pre-
sented to us on the dissecting-table, the Ego remain-
ing intact as before — or of ' bodily functions,' such as
digestion, seems somewhat an obscure conception. Not
much more lucid is that of a mind consisting of
'mental phenomena.' Phenomena are needs pheno-
menal of something; mental phenomena must needs
be phenomenal of the entity we designate Mind — an
entity in its proper nature unknown, yet essential as
ground of the phenomena. As to the quartz illustra-
tion, it is naught, and to be set aside as sinning in the
extrusion of Consciousness, the sole matter to be ex-
plained. The bit of quartz is before me, and I know,.
and can only know it, as an aggregate of certain pro-
perties ; the me also I have cognisance of, solely
through the aggregate of its sensations, thoughts, &c.,
but these do not, as the properties in the other case,
exhaust the sum of my knowledge, for I know them
in the aggregate as mine,. How without a Me pre-
supposed, come they to so aggregate themselves ?
Plainly a Me must be assumed as the very principle
K

146 Mr Mill's Notion of Matter.

of aggregation. What are sensations which are ' my
sensations,' yet moi-mine, as not belonging to a me ?
Speculations, which can only be stated in these gross
forms of contradiction, may be held to bring with
them their own confutation. When Professor Bain,
therefore, concludes — ' A self-determining power, then,
' in a voluntary agent, is merely another, and not a
' good, expression for the ordinary course of the will,
' as we understand it,' he seems to say nothing to the
purpose; the region of Will or Personality, when he
has done all he can with ' volition,' being left behind
him ' unexplored,' so that properly he can be said to
understand nothing whatever of it.

The futility of the whole speculation, it is hoped,
will further and conclusively appear, on a review of
Mr Mill's contribution to the subject in his Chapter
entitled, 'The Psychological Theory of Matter, how
far applicable to the Mind.' With Mr Mill's Psycho-
logical Theory of Matter we are not here directly
concerned, further than as it seems necessary to fix
its postulates. These a.re sensation, expectation — with
memory as the necessary condition of it — association
of ideas, and ' the human mind as capable ' of all these.
So much granted him, Mr Mill proceeds to resolve
what deludes us as the external non-ego of matter
into mere ' permanent possibilities of sensation.' The
discussion is jDf much interest, and in its way may be
ranked as a masterpiece of ingenuity. It seems to
admit of question, indeed, whether the element of
permanence — on which plainly lies the stress of the

On the whole a pretty Eidolon. 147

proof — is fairly deduced from the premises. To my-
self it looks a little as if Mr Mill, more suo, rather
smuggles it in as he proceeds, making quiet ' convey-
ance ' of it, as it were, from the material world, some
eidolon of which he is engaged in trying to construct,
than exhibits it as in rational process evolved. Fur-
ther, it seems a little unfortunate that Mr Mill, in
assuming sensation, and proceeding to work with it
as a fact, of which no explanation is needed, has
really left behind him unsolved, one might almost
say, the whole problem.^ Still, sensations and the

1 Given the Ego (and, as we shall find, Mr Mill is forced, however
against the grain, to concede to ns the Ego), sensation is developed in
it as an effect, some canse of which must be assigned. What is this
oanse ? The Ego in sensation seZ/-determined ? This does not of
itself seem a very feasible speculation, though I vaguely suppose
Fichte, at one moment of his development, may have held some-
thing of the kind ; and as mere matter of course, to Mr Mill it
would be specially abhorrent. If the Ego, then, be not determined
to sensation ab intra, it must needs be determined ab extra ; in
other words, by some form of a Mow-Ego. There does not seem
any escape from this. Shall we assume this non-Ego, as in the
system of the Natural Realist, a material entity known as the exter-
nal world ; or a spiritual one with the Super-Natural Realists— so
call them — of whom Berkeley may stand as type ? It does not seem
to greatly matter which ; at any height of speculation, more especi-
ally in the light of the ' Doctrine of Relativity, ' now very generally
acquiesced in, the distinction between them seems pretty much to
disappear. Suffice it, there is given, in either case, the Ego as real,
and, external to it, a universe of real existence. If belief in some
form of non-Ego is thus, under the law of Causation, forced on us by
the very necessities of thinking, Mr Mill may make what he wiU, and
welcome, of the particular form of it apprehended as matter in con-
sciousness. Nobody is much interested to protect from his attack the
Matter, of which, as truly and in itself existing, nobody professes to
know anything whatever, — Vide Appendix, Note VI.

148 His Eidolon of Mind f

rest given him, Mr Mill, with a little help from per-
manence as he goes, really succeeds in producing a
very pretty eidolon of matter, and proving it, vi^hen
produced, quite as serviceable as the real thing. So
much achieved, and his spick and span new creation
of Matter seeming to him all very good, it occurred
to Mr Mill, in what I must really think a hapless
moment, that perhaps an eidolon of Mind might be
come at on the same terms. Sensation being postu-
lated as before, and along with it now, the circle of
' our internal feelings '^ Mr Mill seeks accordingly to
show, that what we call Mind is sufficiently accounted

1 ' Thus far there seems no hindrance to our regarding Mind as no-
' thing but the series of our sensations (to which must now be added
' our internal feelings) as they actually occur, with the addition of in-
' finite possibilities,' &o.

There seems in this to be some confusion. Mr Mill, who has just
to his own satisfaction argued away externality, seems here to define
sensation, as by contrast, an external feeling. It would be foolish,
however, to press, as against Mr Mill, a confusion which, considered
in itself, he no doubt could readilj' explain as no more than merely
verbal. More pertinent, perhaps, is the following little objection : —
Mr Mill defines Mind here as ' nothing but the series of our sensations, '
together with our 'internal feelings,'— certain Possibilities being
superadded. Now, either Mr Mill does or does not distinguish sensa-
tion as, in some real sense, external, from those other expressly
styled ' internal feelings.' If he does, he seems to admit the non-Ego,
which he has argued out of existence. If, on the other hand, he
does not, some further explanation seems required ; for that very
'series of sensations and Possibilities of Sensation,' which, in this
Chapter, are concreted into the Ego, figured in the last as concreted
into the noM-Ego. How this should be, except in virtue of the funda-
mental antithesis asserted by Hamilton, and by Mr Mill resolutely
denied, Mr Mill can perhaps explain ; but meantime he has not done
so. It seems almost essential that he should.

Not so pretty. 1 49

for as no more than 'the series of those feelings
supplemented by Possibilities of feeling ; ' that the
entity called Mind has, in point of fact, no existence.
But has Mr Mill really forgotten, that in originally
' postulating sensation, expectation,' &c., he was ob-
liged to postulate 'a mind capable' of them; there-
fore an entity of Mind — non-entities being ' capable '
of nothing — of which postulate necessary to his first
demonstration, he must be held to give himself the
benefit in the second, when anew he assumes sensation,
together with ' internal feeling,' and of course ' expecta-
tion,' as before ? Plainly, Mr Mill must have forgotten
it. To postulate a capable entity Mind was legitimate
for Mr Mill in an argument to prove the non-existence
of Matter, but scarcely in one intended to prove the
non-existence of Mind. What logical fallacy is it, in
virtue of which, assuming a thing to exist, we proceed
to prove that it does not, and exhibit as result of our
reasonings the negation of their own premises ? So
far as I am aware, it has not as yet got a name, per-
haps as occurring so . seldom. If we call it a -petitio
principii, run mad like a sceptical philosopher, into
questioning its own existence, we seem to come as near
it as may be. And of this most egregious of fallacies,
Mr Mill is here, beyond all question, guilty. Suppose
Mr MiU — in this following what is plainly the phil-
osophical order — had Icgun by applying his ' Psycholo-
gical Theory' to Mind, instead of beginning, as he
does, with Matter, one is curious to know how he
would have proceeded. With the result at which he

150 Objections Extrinsic and Intrinsic to it.

aims in view, it would hardly have done to postulate,
in exipnss terms, ' a mind capable of expectation,' &c. ;
and a sensation or feeling, without any sentient sub-
ject, and itself^ capable of expectation, is perhaps too
wild a figment for even Mr Mill to take up with. His
'Psychological Theory of Mind' would thus have
fairly foundered on his bauds in trying to take its very
first step. As it is, it only succeeds in making way at
all, by quietly carrying on from the one chapter a pos-
tulate, which stultifies the result laboriously arrived at
in the other.

Further, Mr Mill, having with great pains and really
considerable success defended his Theory of Mind from
certain 'extrinsic objections' alleged as fatal to it,
proceeds to admit with great frankness, '^that ' the

1 Vide Professor Mansel (Prolegomena Logica, p. 139).

' Does it not rather appear a flat self-contradiction to maintain that I
' am not immediately conscious of myself, but only of my sensations
' or volitions ? "Who, then, is this I that is conscious, and how can
' I he conscious of such states 'as mine i In this case, it would surely
' be far more accurate to say, not that I am conscious of my sensations,
'hut that the sensation is conscious of itself ; but thus worded, the
' glaring absurdity of the theory would cany with it its own con-
' futation.'

Now, distinctly Mr Mill either must postulate 'a Mind,' or this
' glaring absurdity' he must postulate. Beaten from his postulate of
a Mind, it is here that he must hide his head ; and indeed he may well
hide it, for the absurdity is by himself admitted glaring ; a sensation
' conscious of itself ' being precisely identical in ineptitude with the
' series of sensations and feelings aware (or conscious) of itself as a
series,' in which Mr Mill, with great frankness, to conclude, admits a
C[uite hopeless paradox. Yet this paradox of ' a sensation conscious
of itself,' and, a little to increase the absurdity, ' capable of expecta-
tion ' to boot, has become the postulate of his argument.

Mr Mill disposes of the Intrinsic ones. 151

' theory has intrinsic difficulties beyond the power of
' metaphysical analysis to remove ; ' the phenomena of
Memory and Expectation ' reducing us to the alter-
' native of believing that the Mind or Ego is something
' different from any series of feelings or possibilities of
' them, or of accepting the paradox, that something
' which ex hypothesi, is but a series of feelings, can be
' aware of itself as a series.' (In other words, Mr Mill,
having postulated Expectation — in which Memoiy
must be held presupposed — admits himself slain by
his own postulate.) It has commonly been supposed
that speculations admitted to involve insuperable diffi-
culties, and to lead into incredible paradox, therein
are, in effect, admitted to be utterly worthless specu-
lations. Mr Mill, however, as neither inclined to ad-
mit his speculation worthless, nor resolute enough in
absurdity to accept the paradox it leads to, proceeds to
save himself thus —

' The truth is, that we are here face to face with
' that final inexplicability, at which, as Sir W. Hamil-
' ton observes, we inevitably arrive when we reach
' ultimate facts ; and in general, one mode of stating
' it only appears more incomprehensible than another,
' because the whole of human language is accommo-
' dated to the one, and is so incongruous with the
' other, that it cannot be expressed in any terms which
' do not deny its truth. The real stumbling-block is
' perhaps not in any theory of the fact, but in the fact
' itself. The true incomprehensibility perhaps is, that
' something which has ceased, or is not yet in existence.

152 Disposes of Himself in so doing.

' can still be in a manner present ; that a series of feel-
' ings, the infinitely greater part of which is past or
' future, can be gathered up, as it were, into a single
' present conception, accompanied by a belief of reality.
' I think, by far the wisest thing we can do, is to ac-
' cept the inexplicable fact, without any theory of how
' it takes place ; and when we are obliged to speak
' of it, in terms which assume a theory, to use them
' with a reservation as to their meaning.'

With every respect for what Mr Mill considers ' by
far the wisest thing we can do,' I cannot but think Mr
Mill would have done a much wiser thing, had he
simply admitted as a datum of consciousness, the Ego
which, as he confesses, his Psychological method has
utterly failed to evolve ; and which, however in itself
inexplicable, satisfactorily explains the phenomena.
As it is, he seems here a little to lie open to the criti-
cism he himself has elsewhere — and I think with
justice — directed against Sir W. Hamilton (p. 544,
545): 'He lays the responsibility of the failure not
' upon his theory (of Pleasure), but upon the general
' inexplicability of ultimate facts. This appears to me
' a great misconception, on our author's part, of what
' may rightfully be demanded from a theorist. He
' 'is not entitled to frame a theory from one class of
' phenomena, extend it to another class which it does not
' fit, and excuse himself hy saying that if we cannot make
' it fit, it is because ultimate facts are inexplicable.' Mr
Mill seems in this, with some closeness, to describe his
own procedure. Again — ' If we do propound a theory,

Greater Griefs in store for Mr Mill. 153

' we are bound to prove all it asserts ; it is not philoso-
' phical to assert a thing, and fall hack upon the in-
' comprehensibility of the subject^ as a dispensation from
' proving it. What is a hindrance to proving a theory
' ought to ie a hindrance to affirming it.'' In which last
sentences Mr Mill must be held to satisfactorily ex-
punge his own Chapter on the ' Psychological Theory
of Mind.'

These little griefs are, however, as nothing to those
which Mr Mill presently goes on to earn for himself,
as obstinately determined not to concede to Hamilton
the Ego as given in Consciousness. The opening
paragraph of his next Chapter (XIII. 'The Psycho-
logical Theory of the Primary Qualities of Matter')
probably includes as much blunder and ineptitude as
any Philosopher has ever yet succeeded in packing in
the same space.

'For the reasons which have been set forth, I con-
' ceive Sir W. Hamilton to be wrong in his statement
' that a Self and not-Self are immediately appre-
' hended in our primitive consciousness. We have, in
' all probability, no notion of Not-self, until after con-
' siderable experience of the recurrence of sensations
' according to fixed laws, and in groups. But without
' the notion of Not-self, we cannot have that of Self
' which is contrasted with it. Nor is it credible that
' the first sensation which we experience awakens in
' us any notion of an Ego or Self. To refer it to an
' Ego is to consider it as part of a series of states of
' consciousness, some portion of which is already past.

154 Experience, Consciousness, and the Ego.

' The identification of a present state with a remem-
' bered state cognised as past, is what, to my think-
' ing, constitutes the cognition that it is I who feel it.
'" I " means he who saw, touched, or felt something
' yesterday or the day before. No single sensation
' can suggest personal identity ; this requires a series
' of sensations, thought of as forming a line of suc-
' cession, and summed up in thought into a Unity.'
(P. 214, 1st Edition.)

Not only is it entirely ' credible ' that ' the first sensa-
tion we experience ' may ' awaken in us a notion of the
Ego,' but — except for his own express testimony to
that effect — I should have held it utterly twcredible
that a man like Mr Mill should conceive of the fact
as otherwise. The ' first sensation we experience ' is, of
course, a fact of ' consciousness ; ' sensations which are
not in consciousness do not, as such, exist, and can be
plainly no part of our 'experience.' Now, how are
we to define Consciousness? Hamilton defines it as
' the recognition by the mind or Ego of its own acts
or affections ; ' and ' in this,' says Mr Mill, ' as he
truly observes, " all philosophers are agreed." ' Con-
sequently, as Mr Mill does not probably mean to
exclude himself as in a minority of one, and no
philosopher, he accepts Hamilton's definition. And
accepting it, he must also accept — however against
the grain — the Ego apprehended in primitive sensa-
tion, as conscious of, or ' cognising its own affection ; '
unless indeed — which seems a little too absurd — he is
prepared to maintain that we can ' experience ' sensa-

The Griefs of Mr Mill great. 155

tions, witliout in the least being ' conscious ' of them.
Mr Mill's whole Chapter XII. 'The Psychological
Theory of Matter, how far applicable to Mind,' is thus
at one stroke demolished. This for Mr Mill seems
sufficiently grievous ; but a worse grief is behind.
For, the Ego being thus given us in primitive con-
sciousness — and this Mr Mill can only deny by rush-
ing upon the wild absurdity above — the Non-Ego is,
according to Mr Mill himself, given us along luitli it.
' Without the notion of mo^Self, we cannot have that
^f Self which is contrasted with it.' The Not-self,
even if it could not otherwise be got at, is thus
legitimated by the Self, given — as we have seen, —
in this necessary 'relation of contrast,' by Mr Mill
himself insisted on. Mr Mill's Chapter XI., there-
fore, 'The Psychological Theory of the Belief in an
External World,' must fleet into the limbo of abortions
along with Chapter XII.; and — sad to say — Chapter
XI. about 'Matter' having fleeted in that direction.
Chapter XIII. about 'The Primary Qualities of
Matter,' may plainly, without curious inquiry into
it, be also held to have fleeted. It seems probable
that considerable sections of Mr Mill's previous direct
criticism of Hamilton's Review of Tluories on iJw,
Belief of an External World, would on any strict
examination of it, be found to have gone the same
bad road. Mr Mill writes a good deal of criticism ;
he supplements it with three Chapters of original and
highly ingenious speculation; then, presto, in about
as many sentences (when we have merely pulled

156 Greater, if possible,

them about a little), he is found to have conclusively-
shattered his own most imposing fabric. Has any-
feat comparable to this been brought home by him
to Sir W. Hamilton ? I trow not. What is specially
to be insisted on is this, that my criticism of Mr Mill
here — which T venture to think cannot at any point
be evaded — shuts him up to acquiescence in the very
doctrine, against which throughout he is arguing —
Hamilton's doctrine to wit, that Consciousness gives
' as an ultimate fact, a primitive dualitj'-, the Ego and
' Xon-Ego in an original synthesis and antithesis.' Mr
Mill, in arguing against Hamilton, is here — though
strangely unaware of the fact — in true and funda-
mental agreement with him. Rere, at least, it seems
shown that the relation of Mr Mill to Hamilton is not
of that absolutely triumphant kind which his idolaters
have been eager to assume it.^

1 Tlie above is repvoduced verbatim from a little paper published
some considerable time before the issue of Mr Mill's third Edition of
his work. That it ever came under the eye of Mr Mill, I have no
special reason to suppose. But that somcliow, he had become uneasily
aware that here he had brought himself to grief, is in his third Edition
made evident. That fatal clause, ' But without the notion of Not-
Self,' &c., he deletes, with this explanatory Note — 'In the first
' Edition I said — "But without the notion of Not-Self, we cannot
' "have that of Self which is contrasted with it." In saying this I
' overlooked the fact that my own sensations and other feelings, as
' distinguished from what I call Myself, are a sufficient Not-Self to
' make the Self apprehensible. The contrast necessary to all cogni-
' tion is sufficiently provided for by the antithesis between the Ego
' and particular modifications of the Ego.'

This is well ; and might almost be held to show that Mr Mill is not
now 'in true and fundamental agreement with Hamilton,' thouch
beyond all question he was so, when he issued his first Edition. And

Not getting any less. 157

Further — ' No single sensation can suggest per-

senal identity; this requires a series of sensations,

'thought of as forming a line of succession, and

summed up in thought into a Unity.' This is

granted ; but with a single sensation as emerging in

Consciousness, there emerges necessarily, as we saw,

the Ego conscious of, or cognising it — the Personality ;

and in order to the notion of identity, only one more

sensation will be needed, cognised as also mine.

Moreover, declining to admit the Ego, as thus

emerging in primitive consciousness, it is surprising

Mr Mill should have failed to see that the Ego, as

it is not unamusing to note, that in getting out of Ms agreement with
Hamilton, he gets out of agreement with Mmself. For his admission
of an original ' antithesis between the Ego and particular modifica-
tions of the Ego, sensations, and other feelings,' simply withers to
the very root his ' Psychological Theory of Mind. ' Moreover, as we
saw (page 147), if Mr Mill will only for an instant inquire as to the
cause of these ' modifications of the Ego,' he will find, perhaps a little
to his disgust, that he is still in so far ' in fundamental agreement
with Hamilton, ' as under his own pet law of Causation, constrained
to admit either a self-determining Ego — which of course he would
rather die than admit — or a Non-Ego of some sort, as a real-external
existence. For, however Mr Mill may wish it otherwise, the ' Sx
nihilo,' &c., remains as an axiom unimpeachable, and a thing which
does not exist, cannot exist as cause. Belief in some form of a Non-
Ego being thus forced upon us by the very necessities of thinking
(supposing we take the trouble to think), does Mr Mill really sup-
pose it of supreme importance to inquire as to the development of
the Non-Ego, empirically apprehended in Consciousness? Meta-
physically the inquiry is of no importance ; psTjchologicaUy it is of
much interest for those who are interested in the spinning of cobwebs,
and like to observe the operation ; somewhat as a curious Naturalist
may delight to watch a spider at work. From this point of view,
Mr Mill's elaborate speculation as to Matter is already sufficiently
recognised, as a great tour de force of ingenuity.

158 Increasing a little, if anything.

he himself proceeds to constitute it, could never at all
have emerged. Nothing is more certain than that
Mr Mill's account of the Ego, as developed in later
Consciousness, necessitates belief in it as given in a
previous Consciousness, which Mr MiU — the argu-
ment being merely pushed back a little — could be
forced to recognise as primitive. ' To refer it (Sensa-
' tion) to an Ego, is to consider it as part of a series
' of states of consciousness, some portion of which is
' already past. The identification of a present state
' with a remembered state cognised as past, is what,
' to my thinking, constitutes the cognition that it is
' T who feel it. " I " means he who saw, touched, or
' felt something yesterday or the day before.' But
surely, in order that ' I ' should have seen or touched
something the day before, ' I ' must then have been in
existence ; ' a remembered state cognised as past,
' and identified with a state now present,' must itself
have been cognised as present in the past to which
reference is made. In order to be recognised, and
identified with a present sensation as also mine,
plainly the sensation in the past, must then have been
so cognised. At whatever point, therefore, in the
series of sensations, Mr Mill makes the Ego commence
its operations in remembrance and identification, he
will be driven to admit that it must have commenced
them hefore, as cognising the thing it now remembers
or recognises. Unless, indeed, Mr Mill's Ego has a
talent for remembering what took place before it came
into existence !

Mr Mill's Ego cognisant, though not alive. 159

Turning to the explanatory Discussion, which Mr
Mni now appends to these Chapters, one is driven
to conclude that an Ego of this kind is really that
substituted by Mr Mill for the Ego of primitive
consciousness. "We there find him writing — ' Since the
' fact which alone necessitates the belief in an Ego,
' the one fact which the Psychological Theory cannot
' explain, is the fact of Memory (for Expectation I
' hold to be both psychologically and logically a
■ consequence of Memory), I see no reason to think
' that there is any cognisance of an Ego, until Memory
' commences. There seems no ground for believing
' with Sir W. Hamilton, and Mr Mansel, that the
' Ego is an original presentation of consciousness ;
' that the mere impression on our senses involves,
' or carries with it, any consciousness of a Self, any
' more than I believe it to do of a N"ot-sel£ Our
' very notion of a Self takes its commencement, there
' is every reason to suppose, from the representation
' of a sensation in Memory, when awakened by the
' only thing there is to awaken it before any associa-
' tions have been formed — namely, the occurrence of
' a subsequent sensation similar to the former one.
' The fact of recognising a sensation, of being reminded
' of it, and, as we say, remembering that it has been
' felt before, is the simplest and most elementary fact
' of Memory.'

This is an excellently clear statement ; and see to
what Mr Mill is self-committed in it ; to r-epresentations
in memory, of sensations, whereof there was no pre-

1 60 Professor Ferrier v. Mr Mill's Ego.

vious 'presentation; to sensations recognised or re-
minded in the present, and yet not in the past origi-
nally cognis&d, or minded ; to ' subsequent sensations '
by the Ego apprehended as ' similar to former ones,'
which the Ego, as not then in existence, could not
possibly then have apprehended. Mr Mill's Ego, as
I said, is an Ego with the mysterious property of
remembering things which took place some time
before it was born.i Mr Mill, in declining to admit

■^ All this is so well and clearly put by Professor Ferrier, that in-
stead of rehashing him as here, I might have been well content simply
to quote his masterly statement of it (vide Institutes of Metaphysic,
p. 81, 82):—

' A theory of self-consciousness, opposed to the doctrine advanced
' in our first proposition, has been sometimes advocated. It reduces
' this operation to a species of reminiscence ; it affirms that we are
' first cognisant of various sensible impressions, and are not conscious
' of ourselves, until we reflect on them afterwards. But this doc-
' trine involves a contradiction ; for it supposes us to recollect
' certain impressions to have been ours, after they have been experi-
' enced, which we did not know to be ours when they were experi-
' enced. A man cannot remember what never happened. If the
' impressions were not known to be ours at the time, they could not
' subsequently be remembered to have been ours, because their re-
' collection would imply that we remembered an antecedent connec-
' tion between ourselves and them ; which connection, however, had
' no place in our former experience, inasmuch as this theory declares
' that no self was in the first instance apprehended ; therefore, if the
' impressions are recognised on reflection to have been ours, they
' must originally have been known to be ours. In other words, we
' must have been conscious of self at the time when the impressions
' were made. '

Could the ' impossible consciousness before consciousness,' which
at starting, I alleged to be involved in Mr Mill's mode of conceiving
the relations of consciousness and experience, possibly be better illus-
trated than as we find it in this passage.

Mr Mill anew defines his Position. 1 6 1

in an Ego, so mysterious in its properties as this
such a trifle, by comparison, as Freedom, seems oddly
to strain at a gnat, after just having swallowed a
camel, as deftly as he might an oyster.

In fine — Mr Mill, in now proceeding to further ex-
plain the position he before took up, writes — ' Having
' stated these facts (of Memory and Expectation) as
' inexplicable by the Psychological Theory, I left them
' to stand as facts, without any theory whatever ; not
' adopting the Permanent Possibility hypothesis as a
' sufficient theory of Self, in spite of the objections to
' it, as some of my critics have imagined, and have
' wasted no small amount of argument and sarcasm in
' exposing the untenability of such a position ; neither,
' on the other hand, did I, as others have supposed,
' accept the common theory of Mind, as a so-called
' Substance.'

Mr Mill seems in this to ignore the not unimportant
fact before noted, that Memory and Expectation, though
'inexplicable' by the Theory he proposes, are quite
satisfactorily explained by the ordinary theory of the
Ego, itsdf inexplicable, yet accepted as a datum, or
more properly, a necessary condition of Consciousness ;
a theory for which he admits, as we saw, thus much is
always to be said, that ' the whole of human language
' is accommodated to it ; and is so incongruous with
' the other, that it cannot be expressed in any terms
' which do not deny its truth.' It seems to me that a
theory which can say this for itself, and which is. fur-
ther commended to us as at once explaining the facts,
L

1 62 With small success — Ike Ego admitted.

which the other Theory is bound to explain and is
driven to confess it cannot, is, of the two, very much
the preferable Theory. But plainly Mr Mill would do
anything rather than admit it so. And yet, in effect,
in the end he admits all that anybody wants of him.
' As such (an original element) I ascribe a reality to
' the Ego — to my own mind — different from that real
' existence as a Permanent Possibility, which is the
' only reality I acknowledge in Matter ; and by fair
' experiential inference from that one Ego, I ascribe
' the same reality to other minds.' This is, in truth, a
virtual concession of all that Hamilton contends for, in
assuming the Ego, as a fact, for which we have the
authority of consciousness. If thus admitting a reality
in the Ego, Mr Mill still declines to admit it, as Sub-
stance, this seems only to mean that Mr Mill is at once
constrained to admit, and yet determined to deny. If
Mr Mill does not define Substance precisely as he must
the Ego — a Eeality, in itself unknown, yet subsumed
as a necessary ground of phenomena — ' a bond of con-
' nection to hold a group or series of otherwise uncon-
' nected phenomena together ' (p. 246) one is puzzled
to guess how he would define it.

On the whole, I think we may conclude with some
confidence, that if the argument from Personality, as
neutralising that against Freedom derived from the
Causation of human actions, in itself be worth any-
thing, it will not be seriously invalidated by any such
sceptical resolution of the human Personality itself, as

The argument from Personality remains. 163

that by Mr Mill here abortively suggested, and admitted
by himself abortive.

And here it may be well to conclude a Dissertation
which has strayed considerably beyond the limits at
first proposed for it. The doctrine of ' Conciliation ' set
forth in it — essentially that, as I believe, by Hamilton
meant to be indicated — which admits Necessity on the
one hand (meaning only the Causation from which, in
the exclusion of Freedom, Necessity might seem to be
a logical inference), yet combines with it a belief in
Freedom, while admitting inability to explain the coin-
herence of the two in human action, or the terms of
their reciprocal limitation, might readily be shown to
be the only one which fits itself to all the facts, and
adjusts the scale of the variations which prevail in our
moral judgments. Further, it will be found that the
sanity of these is compromised, precisely as we ignore,
or even cease to assign its due importance to either one
or other of these constituent factors of human action.
Too exclusively dwelling on Necessity or the Causal
influence, we find it difficult to attribute hlame to any
action whatever ; the springs of healthy indignation

^ A good deal of the ground covered by the foregoing Discussion is
very ably and intelligently gone over iu the concluding Sections of Pro-
fessor Masson's Mcview of Recent British Philosophy ; and while there
is no great similarity in the general treatment here, yet the point of
view at one or two places so closely approximates to his, that this
reference seems only proper. Mr Mill, in his Third Edition, has not
answered Professor Masson's argument ; nor could he, I think, have
done so.

164 Doctrine of ^ Conciliation.'

are relaxed ; and we reach that questionable habit of
mind, in which a bastard charity is one with the
deadliness of moral indifference. Too exclusively
dwelling on Freedom, in oblivion of the awful pres-
sure on 'the afflicted Will'^ of causal circumstance
and temptation, we are but too apt to sin in the
opposite extreme of some rigour of harsh and in-
human judgment. In the one case, our sense of
merit and demerit in actions is apt to be unduly
weakened in a cynical approximation of the two ; in
the other case, the opposite danger is incurred of un-
due exaggeration of both considered as extremes of

00

divergence. Giving to each side of the complex truth
its due ; holding fast the Freedom of the Will, yet re-
membering always the tragical ' afflictions ' to which
it is causally subjected, we have ground, on the one ■
hand, of stern and righteous rigour of judgment ; on
the other, of an infinite tenderness and compassion, a
thoughtful charity which does not wholly exclude from
its regards the vilest and most abandoned criminal who
ever libelled our common humanity. And this is, I
rather think, the ethical attitude, prescribed by our
highest standards.^

^ ' The dread strife

Of poor Humanity's aflBicted Will

Struggling in vain witli ruthless Destiny.' — Excursion.
By "Wordsworth indicated as the root-Idea of all Tragedy. It finely
expresses or implies the doctrine contended for. The Will of Man is
not Free in the absolute sense ; it is an ' afHicted Will,' as beset with
tragical limitations, which, however they perpetually ' afflict,' do not
yet annihilate it as Will.

'■' Some excellent remarks on this subject may be found in the work
of Dr Travis, to which allusion was before made.

Doctrine of ' Conciliation^ 165

If at all we are to divorce in our minds these two
sides of the truth, on the whole it might not be amiss
to consider chiefly the side of Freedom when taking
account of our own rather questionable actions ; ^ that
of Necessity in judging of those of our neighbours. In
regard again of the good actions of ourselves and of others,
it may be better perhaps to reverse this, — considering
chiefly in ourselves the law of necessary Causation,
that of Freedom ^ as the law of other people. By merely
attending to a couple of rules so simple and obvious as
these, a man might almost flatter himself that, accord-
ing to the measure of his attention to them, he was be-
coming as near as possible perfect in the matter of his
moral judgments ; by the discipline of humility on the
one hand ; on the other, of charity, forbearance, and
genial recognition of the good as it lives all round him.
But it is sufficiently obvious that this is seldom our
way of arranging the matter ; that we are a little apt,
on the ground of necessary pressure and temptation, to

^ [The point of view here is, of course, very closely coincident with
that of Mr Mill before he had soared to his higher stage of illumina-
tion on the subject. See passage in his Autobiography quoted in the
preface : ' I often said to myself what a relief it would be if I could
' disbelieve the doctrine of the formation of the character by circum-
' stances ; and remembering the wish of Fox respecting the doctrine of
' resistance to governments, that it might never be forgotten by kings,
' nor remembered by their subjects, I said that it would be. a blessing
' if the doctrine of Necessity could be believed by all quoad the char-
' acters of others, and disbelieved in regard to their own. ']

" ' The Law of Freedom ! ' The expression is at once scientifically
absurd, and non-scientifically accurate. On the one hand, we cannot
conceive of Moral Freedom, except as an outrage of Causal Law ; on
the other, we can only define it as a higher Law of Life, traversing
that Causal One, whose sublimities are those of Death. A Law of

1 66 Moral Bearings of it.

excuse our own little trespasses, forgetting on the same
ground to allow for those of our friends ; on the ground
of Freedom, to glorify our own little pitiful virtues and
immunities, as if they were really ours, while tending
a little to depreciate the perfections of others, as if
scarcely so accurately theirs, as coming to them by
virtue of happy circumstance, and mere necessities of
Law and Nature. And apart from this it seems also
uncommonly obvious that, practically, an admission of
both sides of the complex truth. Causation or Necessity
on the one hand, Freedom on the other, does largely and
induentially determine the moral judgments of man-
kind — from which there might seem to be inference
that the Conciliatory Doctrine, which includes both, is
not very unlikely to be the true one.

^¥hile I am far from thinking that the question of
theoretical belief on this subject is unimportant in its
bearing iipon practice, it is certain its practical influ-
ence may very readily be exaggerated ; as in truth
some tendency to exaggerate it is not unfrequently
to be noted in writers on behalf of Freedom — to say
nothing of the numerous enthusiasts on behalf of it
who, deprived of their gross exaggerations of this kind,
would be left helplessly without an argument. The fal-

Life ! One wonders if it ever occurs to Mr Mill and other gentlemen
of the Omniscient school, to ask themselves what essentially they
know about Life, in any form of it ? According to the latest lights,
the most advanced philosopher yet known can be positive as to nothing
more than this about it — that it is precisely some such unexplained
' Conciliation of Opposites ' as that which he scouts as a puerile de-
lusion, when asserted in the other, or Moral sphere.

Theory and Practice. 167

lacy which underlies these exaggerations has already been
sufficiently discussed {vide p. 112 et seg.) and need not
again be more than merely glanced at. Whether — as
one school of thinkers maintain — the Idea of Moral
Distinctions be come at as a primary intuition, or vital
fact of human Consciousness, or developed as a birth
of Experience under the law of Association — as to
which Mr Mill is clear — is a question somewhat
obscure. Happily, as thus obscure, it is also a little
unimportant, like a good many other deep and obscure
questions ; and the sense of Moral Distinctions, so
rooted in primal instinct, or in habit which has almost
the depth of that, may very well be trusted, in either
case, to maintain itself in life and practice against the
inroads of speculative Theory, accepted with whatever
fulness of conviction; pretty much as the practical
claims of Matter remain unaffected by the reasoning,
however distinctly acquiesced in, which evaporates it
into mere Idea and Illusion. This Analogy, however,
does by no means so accurately go on all-fours that it
could not be shown to limp a little ; ^ and however
it may be easy to exaggerate the probable effects on
conduct of the Theory which, excluding Freedom, for
every consistent thinker, excludes with it Moral Ee-
sponsibility, it has not the less tendencies to influence
conduct, which it is quite idle to suppose not at all ex-
pressed in the result. On this subject, as to which it
would be easy to enlarge, two remarks only. Mr Mill
himself in a general way admits ' the depressing effect
1 Mill and Carlyle, p. 115, 117.

1 68 Theory and Practice.

' of the Fatalist Doctrine, as humiliating to Pride and
' paralysing to Desire of Excellence ' (the believer in
Freedom will do well to retain as much of it as may
be found ' humiliating to Pride ') admitting also that
belief in Freedom has frequently 'given to its ad-
' herents a practical feeling, much nearer to the truth
' than has generally existed in the minds of Ne-
' cessitariaus, and fostered a stronger spirit of self-
' culture ' than the opinion to which it is opposed. It
seems to me that of two opinions, the one which is
admitted to induce ' a practical feeling nearest to the
truth ' is rather more likely to be true than the other.
(As before said, the exact truth is only to be hit by
combining in a wretchedly illogical way the unhar-
monised, yet not contradictory opinions.) And, as we
have abundantly seen, between Mr Mill's Doctrine
denying Freedom, and a Fatalistic one, the distinction
is no more than the dream of an eminent Logician,
whose Logic has for the time gone elsewhere. Further,
it is the most familiar of all experiences that the fullest
belief iu Freedom does not prevent us from habitually
using so much as we admit of Causation in temptation
and malign conjunctions of Circumstance, as excuse to
ourselves of any little lapse we may be guilty of. And
what believing in Freedom, we thus do inevitably, un-
awares, and unconsciously, the belief in Freedom with-
drawn, and Causation only believed in, there seems
really some ground to suppose we might come to do
in full Consciousness, and with express approval of
Eeason. It is in this way, and as subtle anodyne of

The Speculative the Main Interest. 169

one's own accusing Conscience, that practically the
Doctrine of Necessity or Fate is most to be feared. Its
effect, even in this way, may readily enough be ex-
aggerated ; and there does not seem the least risk to
speak of, that, however it might lead us to a little
excuse our own sins, it coiild ever make us sin in any
excess of leniency to those of our friends which might
touch us in either skin or pocket.

The main interest of the question as to human Free-
dom is speculative; and however Mr Mill — as we have
seen — may exhibit himself unable to distinguish be-
tween the practical point of view and the speculative,
the Speculative question remains, when the Practical
one is dismissed as, by comparison, of little import.
Further, at this day remaining, it is not unlikely to
remain some little time longer. Science was really, in
any accurate notion of it, not first constituted as such,
when it attached to itself the title of Positive to conjure
with. Positive Philosophy may be as positive as it
will within its circle of certainty and demonstration ;
but there can never, for the souls of men not merely
bewildered, be anything more to be revered in it than
we find in the Multiplication Table, or in the plain
Mathematical Axiom that two straight lines cannot
enclose a space. (Mr Mill, by the way, supposes that
possibly they may — somewhere else.) The attempt to
find anything more in it is really no whit less ridicu-
lous, than if a delirated Mathematical Sage should go
on all his life producing his straight lines, and an-
nouncing, in what we could scarce call a 'divine

1 70 The Deity at a Discount.

despair/ that though a Space was not yet enclosed,
perhaps one of these days it would be, and that in fact
he was quite positive it would. It seems quite safe to
predict that the exaggerated claim made for Science,
writing Positive after its name, somewhat as a paltry
Parvenu takes a pride in writing himself Esquire, will,
one of these days, be smiled at by all intelligent people
as merely the innocent deliration of such a Mathemati-
cal Sage. Meantime, the phenomenon is curious, as
illustrating the depth of the Eeligious Principle. God
the Father is plainly, in many quarters extinct as an
object of worship. We have found out so many of His
' Laws,' that the difficulty of getting beyond them —
more especially for those who have found them out — is
one in all seriousness to be admitted. Some grand new
' Law ' being discovered, what more natural than that
the Discoverer should assert it distinctly his Law;
furiously throttle a fellow-Philosopher pretending to
have a priority; and dispute any claim to Priority
injuriously asserted for even the Deity Himself?
Nothing is more natural and obvious. The Deity is
thus a little in abeyance just at present ; and even so
exalted a supporter as the Duke of Argyll ^ has not so
brought Him into fashion again as one might have been
disposed to expect. In these circumstances, it is com-
fortable to note the facility with which people who

[1 The allusion here must have been, I suppose, to the Duke's
Reuju of Law, shortly before published. The passage has been
censured as irreverent. I cannot myself see it so ; and I should
seriously desire to know whether it is to the Deity or the Duke of
Argyll that I am supposed to have intended disrespect ?]

Man and Nahire. lyi

ignore the Deity — to deny Him would be to admit Him
as a possible subject of speculation, and pay Him too
great a compliment — can take up witb a Mathematical
Axiom instead ; and failing the Mathematical Axiom
— the discovery being made in mature years that the
affections actually exist as the deepest constituents of
human Nature — can substitute a Wife or a Mistress.^

These frivolities apart, the question of Necessity and
Freedom has been, is, and must remain positively
central to the whole discussion which from age to age
is perpetuated between the Philosophies of Belief and
of Scepticism — the essential field of battle, after skir-
mishing has been done at the outposts. Freedom,
Personality (he who does not admit the terms identical
discredits himself as incompetent) this it is which dis-
tinguishes Man from dead matter and the brute. Is
Man free ? The question is identical with this other
one — Is there in man a spiritual element not present
in an oyster or other mollusc ? Is man, in Shake-
speare's profound and prescient phrase, ' the slave of

[1 I am not without a horrid dread that Mr Mill (supposing him to
have read the little book of which I sent him a copy) may have dimly
suspected in this an allusion personal to himself. Had Mr Mill's
Autobiography been given to the world when I wrote, such an allu-
sion, however held questionable in taste, could not have been called
unfair. As it was, had I meant to hint any such matter, a horse-
pond or the next pump might appropriately have given me my reward.
But I could not intend to allude to matters of which I was ignorant.
The allusion was, of course, not to Mr Mill, but to his distinguished
confrere, M. Comte, with his glorified Clotilde de Vaux, whom he
wished the future world to worship as a substitute for the Virgin
Mary.]

172 Man and Nature.

IvTature/ 1 or its lord ? This is essentially the question
of questions in Philosophy ; the question of the Will
and its Freedom is essentially the question of questions
determinant of any secure settlement of it. So
wrangled over as it has been, almost a certain ridicule
seems fairly enough directed against any one seriously
concerning himself with it. But the ridicule is not
the less idle ; the World does not go on sillily wrang-
ling for thousands of years about matters of no real
importance to it.

' ' The slave of Nature and the son of Hell.' — Richard Til.

APPENDIX.

175

APPENDIX.

Note I. — See p. 11.

Motiveless ob Uncaused Volition.

It has always been a favourite line of argument with Neces-
sitarians to represent the advocates of Freedom as denying
Motives or Causes. Mr Mill, as we have seen, does so ;
and in the latest contribution to British thought on this
subject — Mr SuUy's interesting and ingenious paper ' On the
Genesis of the Free-Will Doctrine" — the same ground is
taken. The assumption is made throughout, that a believer
in Freedom must needs hold himself committed to it, under
the special mode of — to use his own terms — ' the fortuitous
' and unpredictable selection of an undetermined mind or
' will.' 'This,' he says, 'is as good a definition of the
' curious tenet as the present writer is able to frame. And
' to this theory,' he goes on to say, ' which is not only
' unique, but in direct contradiction to the principles by
' which, confessedly, all other departments of phenomena
' are explained, the supporters of Free-will have ijoso facto
' committed themselves.' To such a statement as this, with

^ Sensation and Intellect. Studies in Psychology and jEsthetics.
By James Sully, M.A. Henry S. King & Co., London.

1 76 Uncaused Volition.

every respect for Mr Sully, I must beg distinctly to demur.
That human volition is unique, in the sense of its being
' exempted from the law of Causation,' which dominates ' all
other departments of phenomena,' is plainly an absurd and
irrational proposition ; and a philosopher gives himself easy
times who seeks to confute an opponent, as committed
to it, ipso facto of his belief. 'Many men' {Mill and
Garlyle, p. 76) ' will say that at any given time they feel
' themselves free to eat, or not to eat ; but will any man
' say that when he does eat, he eats not because he is
'hungry, but "for no reason in particular'" (Mr Mill's
pet way of putting it)? 'Plainly there is no such
' blockhead. In the cases, again, in which hunger was
' not the reason of his eating, a man very well knows
' there was some other cause or sufficient reason, failing
' which he would not have eaten. How, this reason sup-
' posed sufficient to make him eat, he should yet have been
' free not to eat, no competent person professes his ability to
' explain.' An incompetent person, who held himself
bound to explain, would, no doubt, unless very incompetent,
speedily find himself in difficulties ; and in seeking a way
out of them, he might not improbably blunder on the an-
nouncement of some such ridiculous ' theory ' as that set
forth by Mr Sully. Indeed, it is not to be denied that
some very profound people have done so. Under stress of
a hopeless argument, which sought to make liberty com-
prehensible, foolish things may have been written — as in
truth a good deal of Philosophy is no more than a record
of the ' follies of the "Wise ' — but such clearly ill-considered
deliverances ought not to be held good as against other
people, who would merely scout and contemn them. ' One
' of the unfairest, though commonest tricks of controversy,'

Uncaused Volition. 177

writes Mr Mill, ' is that of directing tte attack against tlie
' crudest (first crude) form of a doctrine.' It is a trick of
whioli I have shown Mr Mill himself to he guilty, in his
polemic against Hamilton in regard of this particular matter;
and Mr Sully, as we see, follows him to do evil. (As the
merest matter of course, against neither writer do I mean to
insinuate unfairness — which the use of the word trick might
imply, — merely a little misapprehension in both of the true
point of the controversy.)

Mr Sully having given in set terms ' as good a definition
of this curious tenet as he is ahle to frame,' proceeds, in his
next sentence — 'At the same time, it must be remarked
' that its advocates have rarely sought to reduce it to a
' precise definitive form' This seems to mean (at least, I
can no otherwise understand it) that very few indeed of the
advocates of the ' curious tenet ' have ever given any such
definition of it, as that to which all of them, according to
Mr Sully, have, in their belief, ' Ipso facto committed them
selves.' To this ' ipso facto committed ' it is that I particu-
larly take objection. I may believe in Free-wUl, or I may
not (I am not aware of having ever written a word which
pledges me very personally to a belief in it), but supposing I
do believe in Free-will, why am I ' ipso facto committed ' to a
definition or theory of it, framed for me by Mr Mill or Mr
Sully, which seems to me as preposterous and absurd, as it
possibly could to either of them ? Surely it is competent
for me, as for another, to believe in a thing as a fact (on
evidence which seems to me appropriate and suificient), yet
decline to hold myself therein ' committed ' to definitions
and so-called ' theories ' of it which are forged for me by
other people. I may believe in the thing as a fact, whilst
seeing in the sharpest and clearest way that, as no rational
M

1 78 Freedom an Inexplicable.

definition or theory of it can ever possibly be substantiated,
none had best be put forward ; the thing itself believed in,
the express modus or liow of it may be left altogether un-
determined.

Might it be permitted me to quote here (as at p. 152), Mr
Mill's wisdom as regards the Ego (more properly, in a sense,
the ?ioK-Ego — the Ego which Mr Mill in an exceedingly
futile manner, as we have seen, seeks to argue out of exist-
ence) % ' I think by far the wisest thing we can do is to
' accept the inexplicahle fact, without any them-y of how it
' takes place ; and when we are obliged to speak of it, in
' terms 2ohich asaume a theory, to use them with a reserva-
' tion as to their meaning.' So of the Will (which i^ the
Ego, or — nothing). It is surely allowable for us to believe
in the Freedom of the Will as ' an inexplicable fact,' yet
' ipso facto commit ourselves ' to no ridiculous theory of it
— a theory of an inexplicable — unless, indeed, an absurd one
— -being plainly a contradiction in terms.

That this was the view of the matter taken by Sir W.
Hamilton, I have elsewhere, as against Mr Mill (see Section
VII.), sought to demonstrate in extenso. As for Eeid, it is
not to be denied that here and there in his reasonings on
this subject he does glance, in some helpless way, in the
direction of uncaused volition and ' action for no reason in
particular.' But almost invariably when he does so, we find
him contemptuously reprimanded by Hamilton in a note at
the bottom of the page. In elsewhere announcing, as we
have seen (p. 10), ' the Man as Cause,' he shows plainly
that he saw clearly enough the difficulties of such a posi-
tion ; and this special announcement of a Cause (though
futile, as I think it, in the extreme) must in fairness be held
to protect him against the imputation of holding volitions

View of Mr W. T. Thornton. 1 79

to be ' fortuitous,' as exempt from the all-including law of
Causation.

By Mr "W. T. Thbrnton, very recently, this subject has
been incidentally discussed in his essay on " History's Scien-
tific Pretensions ; " ^ and while, on the authority of Con-
sciousness, steadily asserting Free-Will, as an ' indisputable
reality,' he equally asserts as indisputable that ' human voli-
' tions take place as inevitable effects of antecedent Causes ; '
that ' the Will is absolutely subject to, and must implicitly
' obey Causes.' His doctrine, involving belief at once in
Freedom and Necessity (such Necessity, Inevitability — call
it what you will — as may be logical inference from Causa-
tion) is thus identical with that set forth in the foregoing
pages, as essentially (I believe) Sir W. Hamilton's. That
Mr Thornton's discussion (incidental and brief as it neces-
sarily is) can be held at all points satisfactory; that it faces
the full difficulty involved in the very notion of Free- Will,
and makes it the least more comprehensible to us, — I shall
not very confidently assert. Given a chain of Causal se-
quences, in which a particular volition is figured as the last
link, liow, as ' the inevitable effect ' of these determining
antecedents, is it possible to conceive of it as free, in the
sense — the only one which fulfils the definition — that the
man could have determined it otherwise 1 The notion is
quite plainly to our mere Logic incompetent.

More lately {vide passage quoted in the Preface) we have
seen Professor Cairnes take up essentially the same position ;

1 Old - Fashioned Ethics, and Common-Sense Metaphysics. By-
William Thomas Thornton, author of a treatise ' On Labour. ' London :
Macmillan & Co. A book to myself of much interest ; as that of a
vigorous and thoroughly independent thinker, who works out every
subject for himself, and specially is not to be overborne by any weight
of mere authorit)' against him.

i8o Of Professor Cairnes and Dr Carpenter.

' a position no doubt unsatisfactory,' but, as it seems to
him, 'the only one open under the circumstances.' More
lately still, Dr Carpenter (see Contemporary Review, Feb-
ruary 1875, article " On the Doctrine of Human Automat-
ism") has announced his adhesion to somewhat a similar
view. (I quote below the opening passage.) ^ These writers
(and the list might doubtless be indefinitely extended), whilst
holding, in some more or less distinct sense, a belief in Free-
Will — though probably they would all of them decline to
give in the abstract any cut and dried definition of it —
believe also quite as firmly (not improbably a little more so)

^ 'The war between the Ijibertarians and the Necessitarians, the
' partisans of Free-Will and the upholders of Determinism, which has
' been waged for centuries in the provinces of Theology and Meta-
' physics with very little prospect of a definite result, has latterly
' been carried into the domain of Physiology, where the Determinist
' army has found a great accession of strength, not only in the num-
' ber of the recruits who have joined its standard, but in the ability of
' their leaders and the strength of its positions. From the confidence
' with wliich what are asserted to be the inevitable conclusions of
' Physiological Science are now advanced in proof of the Determinist
' hypothesis, it might be supposed that some new facts of peculiar
' importance had been discovered, or some more cogent deductions
' drawn from the facts previously known. But after an attentive re-
' examination of the whole question, I find nothing in the results of
' more recent researches to shake my early-formed conviction of the
' existence of a fundamental distinction, not only between the rational
' actions of sentient beings guided by experience and the aiitomatic
' movements of creatures whose whole life is obviously but the work-
' ing of a mechanism, but also between those actions (common to man
' and intelligent brutes) which are determined by a preponderating
' attraction towards an object present to the consciousness and those
' {^peculiar as J believe to man) in which there is, at one stage or another,
' a distinct intervention of the self-conscious Ego, whereby the direction
' of the activity is modified.' See various other passages — one in par-
ticular, in which he speaks of the Determinists as ' seeing only one
' side of the shield.'

Causes by all admitted. 1 8 1

in the law of Causation, as universal and inclusive of human
volition j and to a man they would resent with scorn the
imputation that, in announcing their helief in Freedom,
they had ' ipso facto committed themselves ' to any such
absurd ' definition ' of it, as that which Mr Sully has given
us, as ' the best he is able to frame.' It would not be fair
to say that Mr Sully is here fighting a phantom of his own
creation ; but it seems to me he is kicking a corpse. It is
an amusing and harmless recreation — amusing to Mr Sully
(as also to some of his readers), and not very seriously doing
harm to any one except himself. This ' curious tenet ' — as
Mr Sully calls it — curious as it may seem to Mr Sully, is
still to some extent believed in ; the Libertarian is not just
yet an extinct animal, who has disappeared in the process of
Evolution. The ' Scientist ' — as of late he always conceit-
edly calls himself — (no such word, I venture to think, can
be shown me in any English Dictionary half-a-dozen years
old) has not quite yet been able to make away with him ;
he is stiU to be found existing under scientific conditions ;
and as so existing, a Libertarian who is not also as sound
a Determinist (in the sense of admitting motive as cause)
as Mr Sully or Mr John Stuart Mill, is, I rather think, a
rara avis.

Since reading Mr Sully, I have rapidly run through again
Professor Bain's Historical Sketch of the subject, to which,
as ' a very good resume ' of it, Mr Sully himself refers. I do
not find that his notion of volitions fortuitous, as indetermi-
nate or uncaused, to any great extent figures in it, as expressly
announced by the advocates of Eree-WUl. It chiefly turns
up as a reductio ad dbsurdum, which is sought to be forced
upon them by their opponents. And this use of it is a per-
ectly legitimate one. If we must needs conceive of human

1 82 Causes and Freedom.

Freedom (as apart from our practical hdief of it), it is only
thus absurdly that we shall find ourselves able to do so.
' The inconceivability of an absolute commencement,' writes
Hamilton, ' on the fact of which commencement the doc-
trine of liberty inoceeds ;' meaning only, it is plain, a
notional fact, as distinct from a fact of existence, — a notion
which, even in trying ' to think it as iruej we ' cannot
think as ■possiMe'' — yet the only notion of Freedom com-
petent to us, when we seek to evolve it in the lorocess of
thought. I am inclined to question whether, in announcing
the Will exempted from the law of Causation (and of course
the thing has been done), any one can ever have seriously
intended more than this. I think it likely that in speaking
of Free- Will, 'in terms which assumed this theory,' the
philosophers doing so must have used them (see Mr
Mill as quoted) ' with a reservation as to their meaning.'
It is certain that if any one maintains that, because
free volition can only be conceived by us under the
mode of absolute or uncaused origination, it is under
this mode to be helleved, he ' ijjso facto commits him-
self to patent and staring absurdity. Dr Clarke has said
(see page 121) that assurance of Freedom is given us 'in
every experience of every act we perform ; ' it is at least
equally certain (and some may think it rather more so)
that in ' every experience of every act we perform ' in full
consciousness, we have assurance of motives and causes.
And in aid of our detailed experience, the reasoned ' induc-
tion from experience ' to the effect that our volitions, like
all else, are subject to causative law and order, has the force
of a scientific demonstration. Hume, in his essay on the
subject (Professor Bain inhis historical resume oddly omits
allusion to him), may be held to have once for all shown

Objections to the term Necessity. 183

this ; and scarce anything has since been written on that
side of the question which is not merely a rehash of his
argument. Mr Mill's restatement of it (in his chapter against
Hamilton) is of course lucid, coficise, and masterly — but all
the while merely irrelevant, inasmuch as Hamilton can
clearly have never intended at least to enunciate the
doctrine against which Mr Mill is arguing. (See Section
VII).

Mr Sully, I observe, deems it of importance — ' following
' excellent examples,' as he thinks them — to ' discard the
' terms ITecessity and Freedom, and employ the expressions
' determined or determinate, with their opposites, because
' the latter confessedly express the real issue of the dispute,
' while the former are very misleading through other and
' irrelevant associations.' Mr Mill makes a great deal of
this. ' I perceived ' — see Autobiography as quoted in Pre-
face — ' that the word Necessity, as a name for the doctrine
' of Cause and Effect applied to human action carried with
' it a misleading association ; and that this association was
' the operative force in the depressing and paralysing influ-
' ence which I had experienced ; ' and in the chapter I have
been engaged in criticisitig, he labours this point a good
deal. Professor Bain similarly writes of ' the obnoxious
' terms Liberty and Necessity,' saying that ' much of the
' apparent mystery lies in the employment of this unsuitable
' language ; ' and generally, writers of the school seem to
think that by extrusion of these terms a good deal has
really been done to elucidate this abstruse subject. Earlier,
it had occurred to Dugald Stewart that if ' the word Neces-
sity ' were only recognised as ' in this discussion altogether
unmeaning and insignificant, the whole system of Spinoza,'
with aU its ' most alarming conclusions,' would, j^^esto 1

184 Answer to these.

become 'nothing better than a rope of sand' — -which is
certainly a ' short and easy method ' of disposing of poor
Spinoza. Professor Huxley, also, when he writes — ' Fact
' I know, and Law I know ; but what is Necessity but
' an empty shadow of the mind's own throwing ? ' seems
to suspect in the word some mysterious power to do evil
in the way of misleading mankind. It is perhaps a little
bold to say such a thing ; but it seems to me the only
people who have ever been seriously misled in the matter are
they who suppose, as above, that by getting rid of the mere
word Necessity, they get rid of one iota of the difficulties
which have always beset the subject. In saying that human
actions are in the opposite doctrine held necessary, no ad-
vocate of Freedom can ever possibly have meant more than
that they are held to be inevitable, as determined ; and no
consistent Causationist, in saying that actions are deter-
mined, can possibly ever mean less than this. If any action
is said to have been evitable, hoii}, I desire to be informed,
should this have been so, save on the opposite hypothesis
of Freedom, or by the supposed interpolation of other causes
than those in the case really present? — and nobody wiU
undertake to inform me. Substitute, then, for the ' ob-
noxious term Necessary ' inevitable — for Necessity, inevita-
bility — the whole matter remains as it was ; and it is not
quite easy to see ground of escape, as Mr MiU did, from
the ' moral paralysis and depression ' which afflicted him
in the other phraseology.

And what, let me ask, are the so-called 'misleading
associations ' with this ' obnoxious word Necessity V 'It
' signifies in its common employment compulsion,' says Mr
Mill (Mill on Hamilton), physical coercion or constraint.
Elsewhere, says Mr Mill (see Logic), — ' It involves more

Answer to these. 185

' than mere uniformity of sequence, it implies irresistible-
' ness.' That Necessity (the word) ' signifies ia the common
employment compulsion,' is, I think, an inaccurate state-
ment. What it signifies ' in its common employment ' is, if
I mistake not, inevitahility as before suggested — a conviction
in the mind of the man using it that by no possibility (on
this theory) could the fact as it happened have been other-
wise ; and in. this signification there is nothing whatever to
' mislead.' Again, says Mr MUl, ' it (the word Necessity)
' involves more than mere uniformity of sequence ; it implies
' irresistibleness.' Supposing it does imply or involve irresis-
tibleness (as of course it does), it implies and involves no-
thing more than the law of Causation itself does, for people
who have really grasped it once for all in its Universality,
and having done so, can heep a firm hold of it. But this
Mr Mill cannot do, nor apparently any of the gentlemen
who choose to sail in the same leaky boat with him. ' Mr
' Mill,' says Mr Sully, ' has very ably put this part of the
' argument in its true light, showing that though the fact '
(of unexplained variabilities in conduct) ' disproves necessity,
' or irresistible sequence, unsusceptible of counteraction or
' modification, it does not touch the question of causality ' (as
if any one ever supposed it did, save as ignorant of the ABC
of the subject). So little ' able ' is Mr Mill's argument at
this point, so far as I am ' able ' to understand it, that I re-
gard it (differing in this from Mr Sully) as nothing better
than a tissue of the grossest confusions.

Somewhat to the like effect. Professor Bain (Mental and
Moral Science, p. 422), 'And lastly ' (the context is in the
present reference irrelevant), ' since we are at the scientific
' point of view, there is strongly suggested the conception of
' resistless sequence — a notion strictly applicable to many

1 85 Causal Sequences resistible.

' material phenomena, but incorrect as to human actions'
Professor Bain, in so writing, considers he ' is at the scien-
tific point of view ; ' had he said the zmscientifio point of
view, his Science would perhaps have been a little sounder.
Will either Professor Bain or Mr Sully (as both stand bound
to do) produce me an instance of human action in the past
(and as in the past, so in the future) in which the causal
sequence was ' resistible, as susceptible of counteraction or
modification ' ? It will be at their proper peril as Causa-
tionists that they commit themselves to any such attempt.
Two minutes' consideration of the — Iwiu resistible, except by
a change supposed in the antecedents, in the implication of
other causes 1 — will be sufficient to warn them away from it.
Then why should either of them so write 1 Echo will not
improbably be left to answer.

In brief, to allege resistihility of a causal sequence is to
allege alterah'dity in the result : irresistibility in the sequence
implies the inevitable — the unalterable, as regards the result ;
resistihility, the evitable, or in result alterable. If any
one can see a logical distinction between these, he has the
advantage of me in the matter of intellectual subtlety ; but
it is an advantage I do not greatly envy him, and am will-
ing that he should retain. And this of the alterable and
unalterable in human action I have already discussed with
Mr Mill, so as to make further remark on it unnecessary.
(Vide section VIIL, pp. 83-87. See also, as to Mr Mill's
notion of moral causes ' being never uncontrollable,' note,
p. 82.) The truth of the matter might seem to be,
that while Mr Mill and his disciples constantly keep
twitting their opponents (as I have tried to show, un-
permittedly) with denying the universality of Causation
in order to maintain Freedom, they themselves per-

Hume s Doctrine of Ca^lsat^on. 187

sistently imply a denial of it, in order to evade the
moral difficulty.

As to Mr Mill's notion that because in Causation (sup-
posing it were so, as Hume sceptically suggests) there is no
nexus, or ' mysterious tie,' between a cause and its effect,
— nothing but mere ' uniformity of sequence,' — the moral
bearings of the argument are altered, I should prefer not to
discuss it. As to Hume's so-called Doctrine or Theory of
Causation (as if a sceptical suggestion could accurately be
called either a Doctrine or a Theory), a great deal of the
merest nonsense has been written, of which, in my own
person, I desire to avoid making increment.^ I shall only

^ With some diffidence I allow myself merely two words or so on
the subject. Certain sequences are found in our experience indefin-
itely variable ; certain other sequences are so found invariable. To
these last we appropriate the term causal in the understood sense.
And now, whence or how this invariability experienced — and, as
hitherto experienced, with a confidence which is absolute, antici-
pated — in certain sequences termed causal, and not in others ? Reason
here, as everywhere, inquires, and cannot but inquire, the how of the
business — the rational ground of the phenomenon. To put it a little
in the scholastic way — abstraction being made of the invariability
from the concrete cases, in all of which it is present, we may logically
figure it as an effect, some cause of which must be assigned. And on
the slightest inquiry as to the catise of this invariability vouched to us
by our experience in certain sequences and not in others, we shall
find ourselves inevitably driven on the Jiexus of power, competently
questioned by Hume, as reasoning from his premises assumed ; incom-
petently, as I think, denied by Brown, Mill, and the rest, who, ac-
cepting Hume's sceptical doubt, have deepened it to the dogmatic
ground. That between a Cause and its Effect no nexus is obvious
to sense it was simply for Hume to point out, with the sceptical
suggestion on his received principles implied in this. That, under
the Causal relation itself, the nexus thus called in question was a
necessary inference of reamn, it would be stupid, T think, to suppose
that Hume himself was so stupid as not very clearly to see ; though
from his point of view assumed of the Sceptic, it was not for him to

1 88 The Inevitable.

say tliat, so long as these ' uniformities of sequence ' con-
tinue uniform, as they seem likely yet a while to do, the
logic of this business remains precisely as it would he,
in admission of the nexus of power denied. At least
I can no otherwise see it. The inevitable must in either
case be admitted, as involved in the ' Law of Causation.'
In either case, to seek to evade this inference of the
Inevitable is implicitly to rush upon denial of the uni-
versality of the Law. And this Inevitable announced is
all that any rational creature can ever have meant in
his use of ' the obnoxious term N"ecessity,' in setting
forth the plea for Freedom.

indicate this. ' I hope I can answer my own doubts. ' ' If, in order
' to answer my doubts, new principles of Philosophy must be laid, '
&c. (See page 234.)

Moral Respo7tsibility. 189

Note II.— See p. 62.

{Mill and Carlyle, p. 45 et seq.)

' And now of Moral Eesponsibility, and this latest attempt
of Mr Mill to harmonise it, as an admitted fact of Conscious-
ness, with his scheme of Causationism, as exclusive of
human freedom, defined an Ability in man to act otherwise
than as he does act. "What,'' asks Mr Mill, "is meant by
" Moral Eesponsibility '? Eesponsibility means Punishment.
" When we are said to have the feeling of being morally
" responsible for our actions, the idea of being punished for
"them is uppermost in the speaker's mind." When Mr
Mill, having asked in the first sentence — " What is meant
by moral responsibility ? " answers in the second — " Ee-
" sponsibility means punishment ;" and goes on in the third
to speak of our "feeling of being morally responsible,"
nobody could at first sight interpret him otherwise than as
speaking of Moral Eesponsibility throughout. But in the
light of the distinction he makes a little farther on between
" the belief that we shall be made accountable, and the
" belief that we ought so to be," the last of which only it is
which "can be deemed to require or presuppose the Free-
will hypothesis," there seems ground to suspect that by
Eesponsibility, as used in the second sentence, he means
Eesponsibility simple, as distinguished from the Moral

1 90 The Simple Responsibility and the Moral.

Eesponsibility indicated in the first and third. i But surely,
if this be so, Mr Mill in this all-important point of definition,
is guilty of no little slovenliness. For, of course, he must
very well know — as himself frequently so using the word —
that when, without qualification, we speak of Eesponsibility,
it is Moral Eesponsibility we expect to be understood to
mean. Wherefore, from this in the first sentence he was
clearly bound to formally distinguish it in the second, and
again to distinguish in the third by " When we are said on
" the. other hand" or some such equivalent of contrast. The
truth might almost seem to be, that indicating the distinction
between the simple Eesponsibility and the moral one, he
was content with a most confused indication of it, as feeling
in some semi-conscious way that it would not in the least
suit him to elaborate it into clearness. As the distinction,
so simple as it seems, is really one of quite cardinal import-
ance for the argument, let us do for it in a cursory way
what it did not suit Mr Mill to do. Any Imperative which
has force to make itself effective wiU constitute a Eespon-
sibility in the subject of it ; only a Moral Imperative can
constitute a Moral Eesponsibility. To illustrate in an easy
way — in the case of a tyrannical schoolboy, who says to a
little fellow not his fag — for over Mm there would be some

1 This, of course, must be Mr Mill's meainng. " What is meant hy
" Moral Responsibility? Responsibility means Punishment. "When we
" are said to have the feeling of being morally responsible for our
' ' actions, the idea of being punished for them is uppermost in the
speaker's mind. " But the idea of punishment being uppermost, implies,
of course, some correlative idea as undermost in the mind of said speaker.
Being "moraH?/ responsible" includes therefore something more than
is given in the Responsibility which merely "means punishment."
Let this distinction by Mr Mill liimself — however loosely — indicated
be carefully kept in view.

Distinction between these. 191

semblance at least of right — " Go to my bed, you young
" hound ! and warm it for me, till I come, or if you don't,
"I'll thrash the life out of you,"- — an Imperative is
announced by the big fellow, and it constitutes a Eespon-
sibility in the little one, inasmuch as he knows, if he refuses,
he will be made to answer for his conduct. This, as a mere
appeal to fear, is the simple or tride imperative as dis-
tinguished from the human or Moral Imperative, whose
appeal is to our moral judgments of merit and demerit in
conduct. If, instead of telling him to warm his bed for him,
the big fellow had said to the little- — " Go rob me Farmer
Hodge's orchard, and bring me hither the apples," the
little fellow would have found himself the subject of the
Brute and the Moral Imperatives in conflict, and would have
had to elect which of them to obey. Again, there are mixed
Imperatives, in which the two elements may coinhere in
proportions indefinitely variable. Such are the authority
exercised by a parent over a child, and that of the law
prohibitive of crime on penalty. With the first of these
we are not here directly concerned. As to the Law, in so
far as its appeal is to fear simpliciter, it is important to note
it as merely a form of the lower or Brute Imperative ; and
though in most minds this more or less connects itself with
some form of the higher or Moral one, the essential distinc-
tion between them is not thereby aff'ected. A caitiff who
refrains from murder solely because he dreads being hanged
for it, is the mere slave of the Brute imperative ; he, on the
other hand, to whom " Thou shalt not kill " comes as a
clear mandate of his moral nature, is indeed, in virtue of
the accompanying threat, also a subject of the lower Impera-
tive, but more or less he is made free of its jurisdiction by
the life within him of the higher one. Xow, the clear dis-

192 Confused by Mr Mill.

tinction between these, -which, is untouched by the fact that
they may efficiently coexist in proportions varying in vari-
ous minds, Mr Mill has seen fit to indicate only to confound
it. In his preliminary definitions it is slurred ; and through-
out the subsequent discussion it is never steadily kept in
view, the word responsibility (or accountability, as it may
be), being used indifferently to imply the simple or the
moral one, so that which of the two is really meant it is
sometimes not easy to know. And in thus playing fast
and loose with the distinction, Mr Mill has in one sense
done wisely, inasmuch as he could not have clearly and
consistently exhibited it without exhibiting along with' it
the inconsequence of his whole argument. For, standing
pledged as he does to constitute for us on the principle of
M"ecessity the Moral Imperative, in order to maintain the
validity of which it is that his opponents postulate Freedom,
he constitutes for us in that argument only the simple or
Brute Imperative, our social right to exercise which is in-
ferred from the efficacy of fear simpliciter as a motive. This
we proceed to show.^

' " It is not," writes Mr Mill, " the belief that we shall bo

\} See— as to the distinction in the above insisted on — Mr Mill's
last Essay " On Theism," only the other day published. " A rule to
which we feel it a duty to conform, has in common with laws, com-
monly so called, the fact of claiming our obedience ; but it does not
follow that the rule must originate, like the laws of the land, in the
will of a legislator or legislators external to the mind. We may even
say that a feeling of obligation which is merely the result of a com,-
mand is not what is meant by moral obligation, which, on the contrary,
supposes something that the internal conscience bears witness to as bind-
ing in its own nature. "

Nothing can be clearer than this ; and this last, or moral obli-
gation, of which Mr Mill here expressly has pledged himself to treat,
it will be found that he ignores in his argument.]

Mr Mill defines the Real Question. 1 93

" made accountable for our actions, whicli can te deemed to
" require or presuppose tlie Free-wUl hypothesis ; it is the
" belief that we ought so to be ; that we are justly account-
" able; that guilt deserves punishment. It is here that the
" main issue is joined between the two opinions." And
again — " The real question is one of Justice ; the legitimacy
" of retribution or punishment." Mr Mill, having thus
stated the " main issue " and the " real question," it seemed
reasonable to suppose that accepting these ideas (of " guilt
deserving punishment " — of Justice involving " the legiti-
macy of retribution,") as given in our moral consciousness,
he proposed to show that, in their own nature, said ideas
did 7iot of needs presuppose the hypothesis of Freedom, but
that an adequate basis could be found for them in the rival
scheme of Necessity. This, however, is only in part the
case. In the course of the discussion, Mr Mill says that he
" can find no argument to justify" punishment inflicted on
the principle of "a natural affinity between the ideas of
" guilt and punishment, which makes it intrinsically fitting
" that wherever there has been guilt, pain should be in-
" flicted by way of retribution." The " main issue" being
as to a "justly accountable " in the sense that " guUt de-
" serves punishment," — " the real question " one of " Justice
" — the legitimacy of retribution," it might seem that the
idea of Eetribution being thus explicitly discarded, that of
Justice, by Mr Mill himself given as its moral equivalent,
must needs be dissipated along with it, so that there is no
longer before us any question whatever. But with Justice
Mr MiU is indisposed to part company. Eeserving formal
remark on this disjunction in the process of his argument of
ideas in his premises identified, let us see how Mr MUl suc-
ceeds in his attempt to substantiate the idea of Justice.
K

1 94 Evades the Real Question.

' " The real question is one of justice, — the legitimacy of
" retribution or punishment. On the theory of Necessity,
" we are told, man cannot help acting as he does ; and it
" cannot be just that he should be punished for what he
" cannot help. !N"ot if the expectation of punishment en-
" ables him to help it, and is the only means by which he
" can be enabled to help iil To say that he cannot help
" it, is true or false according to the qualification with which
" the assertion is accompanied. Supposing him to be of
" a vicious disposition, he cannot help doing the criminal
" act, if he is allowed to believe that he will be able to
" commit it unpunished. If, on the contrary, the impres-
" sion is strong on his mind that a heavy punishment will
" follow, he can, and in most cases does, help it. There
" are two ends which, on the !N"ecessitarian theory, are suffi-
" cient to justify punishment ; the benefit of the offender
" himself, and the protection of others."

' All which is most lucid and exact, but with " the real
" question of Justice," whereof Mr Mill supposes himself to
be discoursing, has literally nothing whatever to do. The
Justice of which Mr Mill stands pledged to treat is Moral
Justice, in its severe regard of the past, inflicting punish-
ment as deserved ; and for this Mr Mill, as he proceeds,
quietly substitutes a simple expediency as respects the
future. 1 The feat of logical legerdemain is facilitated by an

^ We, of course, cannot be unaware that in this reference to ex-
pediency we niay he held to be running our head inadvertently
against Mr Mill's Utilitarian theory of Morals ; but that Mr Mill in
his own person cannot object to the distinction made here, will be
evident from these snatches from his work on the subject — "This
" seems the real turning-point between morality and simple expedi-
" ency "^"The distinction between the feeling of right and wrong and
"that of ordinary expediency,"— and mure explicitly— " Is then the

Evasion of the Real Question. 195

ambiguity in terms. There is Justice as above defined :
there is the justice of a remark or an anticipation j we
speak of a just (as a fit or expedient) arrangement ; and we
consider we justify an action when we prove it negatively
permissible. Any one may see at a glance that in the pas-
sage quoted, Mr Mill's reasoning succeeds in at all connect-
ing itself with " the real question " solely by a disgraceful
jumble of such various meanings of the word. Mr Mill,
when asked whether it hejitst, i.e., deserved,^ in the sense in
which " guilt deserves punishment " — that a man should be
punished for what he could not help in the past, considers
he replies in the affirmative, when he says it is expedient to
punish him, as we flog an uncleanly cur to improve its man-
ners in the future. Of the following instance of the confusion
what is to be said 1 — " Free-will or no free-will, it is just to
" punish men for this purpose (of protection), exactly as it
" is just to put a wild beast to death for the same purpose."
This only, that these same wild beasts to which Mr Mill
seems partial,^ have been known in the rage of hunger to
make away with a philosopher ; and farther, that the man
who should speak of a shot tiger, as having "justly met its
doom,'' exactly in the sense of the words as applied by him
to a human miscreant, would simply prove he had either

"difference between the Just and the Expedient a merely imaginary
" distinction ? By no means. The exposition we have given of the
"nature and origin of the sentiment recognises a real distinction."

■'■ " It is universally considered y!«i that each person should obtain
' ' that (whetlier good or evil) which he deserves ; and unjust that he
" should obtain a good, or be made to undergo an evil which he does
"not deserve. This is perhaps the clearest and most emphatic form
" in which the idea of Justice is conceived by the general mind." —
Vide Mill's " Utilitarianism," page 65.

^ The allusion is to Mill's passage glanced at (pp. 103-105), "nox-
ious beasts, &c.," and my criticism of it which had preceded.

196 Verbal Fallacies.

some twist in his moral perceptions, or was grossly ignorant
of language. Again — what of this % " To punish a man
" for his own good, provided the inflicter has any proper
" title to constitute himself a judge, is no more unjust than
" to administer medicine ! " Has the giving of medicine to
a patient any relation whatever to Justice 1 Clearly not —
unless, indeed, the patient has paid a fee for it, in which
case the doctor would doubtless Yte unjust, if he fraudulently
refused to fulfil his part of the bargain. Otherwise, how-
ever it might be proper and humane to administer medicine,
improper and inhuman not to administer it, to speak of its
being given or withheld as either just or unjust, is merely
to pass an outrage on the accepted meaning of terms. It
is easy for a man at this rate allowed him, to prove what-
ever he pleases. If, in using the word white, he means
in one sentence white, blue perhaps in the next, and green
as it may chance in a third, naturally he puzzles you a
little, somewhat as Mrs Quickly did Falstaif — you " know
" not where to have him." " In the present case," writes
Mr Mill a little previously, " there is more than a verbal
" fallacy, but verbal fallacies also contribute their part."
Undoubtedly they do ; verbal fallacies contribute, in point
of fact, the main part of Mr Mill's argument.

' " Not if the expectatioji of punishment enables him to
" help it," &c. This clause has, indeed, a correspondence
with "the belief that we shall be made accountable for
" our actions," by Mr Mill himself, as we saw, set aside as
irrelevant to the discussion ; its relation to the " main
" issue " involved in our " being justly made accountable,"
and the fact " that guilt deserves punishment," is by no
means quite so obvious. Of the simple or Brute Impera-
tive, justifiably (permissibly) announced by society for its

Of the Moral Imperative no trace. 197

own ends, an instance is here admitted ; but of the Moral
Imperative there is as yet no hint ; and the only Justice
involved is a consideration of social expediency, which
justifies (or makes permissible) our announcement of the im-
perative of fear ; a consideration in no respect of principle
to be distinguished from that which is the ground of our
flogging a cur to teach it to respect the carpet. The cur
alike and the man here are mere slaves of the Brute Impera-
tive. " Suppose him to be of vicious disposition," and so
on. In nothing of all this have we got beyond the first
rude motive of fear, as we may find it urgent on occasion in
the basest of the lower animals. Of the higher, or Moral
Imperative, the keenest partisan of Mr Mill will seek in
vain for a trace throughout his entire discussion, saving as
he seems at times to imply that out of the primitive element
of the Brute Imperative, it is possible psychologically to
grow the Moral one ; a point which will afterwards turn up
for consideration.

' Further — " There are two ends which, on the Necessi-
" tarian theory, are sufficient to justify punishment; the
" benefit of the offender himself, and the protection of
" others." That it may be justifiable to punish a man for
his own good, as we conceive it, even though he should not
deserve punishment, is perhaps with limitations to be ad-
mitted — limitations which we should expect Mr MUl, of all
men, as the author of the noble Tractate " On Liberty," to
recognise very sharply. But solely in virtue of the man's
deserving the punishment can we accurately call it jtist. To
justify any course of conduct, punitive or other, is, as we
have before said, to prove it negatively permissible — to prove
it not in any flagrant sense unjust ; it may also, of course,
be to prove it positively proper, its propriety having been

igS Just and Unjiist.

called in question. But countless things are proper, and
even obligatory, the obligation to -wbicli is not one of Justice ;
countless things are not unjust, to speak of which as just
could be only to incur ridicule. But wherefore labour a
matter, Mr Mill's fallacy in regard of which is obvious in
his own illustration, already in the casual way glanced at 1
" To punish him for his own good is no more unjust than
" to administer medicine.'" To administer medicine to a
patient is not unjust ; also it is not unjust to shave one's
self of a morning. Yet — the question of fee in the former
case apart — the relation to positive Justice is, in the two
cases, identical ; it is in both a purely negative relation —
no relation at all. Here, as throughout the discussion, it is
the whim of Mr Mill to disport himself some miles from
" the real question," as we have seen it by himself indicated.
Again, as to punishment which has for its end " the pro-
tection of others," it seems plain that, justly or even justi-
fiably — pace Mr Mill, there is between the two a slight dis-
tinction — we could not inflict it on a man who had in no
sense deserved punishment. On occasion of a murder, for
instance, the real culprit being non inventus, we could
scarcely clutch hold of a rough at random and hang him for
it. For protective purposes — the public presumed ignorant
of the little deceit practised on it — the innocent rough
would be excellent ;' yet Justice for those behind the scenes
would surely receive in his dying struggles no very sublime
illustration. Clearly, as it seems to us, for no social end to
be served by it, could we justly inflict punishment, save in
virtue of that evil desert in the subject of it, which consti-
tutes the punishment in some sort a retributive one. Touch-
ing this evil desert it is, that, according to Mr Mill, " the
^ As to this, see Section V., p. 49.

yust and Unjust. 1 99

" main issue is joined between the two opinions." But no-
where does Mr Mill join issue on it ; he evades it here and
throughout. Of " punishment as a precaution taken by
" society in self-defence '' here is accurately the sum of
what Mr Mill has to say. " To make this just, the only
" condition required is, that the end which society is at-
" tempting to enforce by punishment should be a just one.
" Used as a means of aggression by society on the just rights
" of the individual, punishment is unjust. Used to pro-
" teot the just rights of others against unjust aggression
" by the offender, it is just. If it is possible to have just
" rights, it cannot be unjust to defend them." Eeaders
must be left to find their way as they can in this jungle
of justs and unjusts ; we must really decline to enter it
with them. Yet, timidly treading its outskirts, let us
just glance at the last sentence. It is possible, we sup-
pose, to have "just rights;" but a master of English like
Mr Mill would, we think, be unlikely to use such a phrase,
unless under the mask of a tautology he wished to insinuate
a sophism. Did ever any one hear of unjust rights, or of
just wrongs ?i Farther, — the rights being admitted just
rights, not unjust ones, we are told " it cannot be unjust to
" defend them." And of course it cannot, if justice be con-
sulted in the means employed to defend them. But it is

1 "Just rights," though unquestionably it is tautological, is such a
common and authorised way of speaking, that it was hardly worth
while to comment on it. Mr Mill, however, in so far admits the little
point made against hira, that in his later editions he inserts the par-
enthesis — "If it he possible to have just rights (which is the same
thing as to have rights at all)." Why, then, in a severe argument
about Justice — except to confuse the discussion — use the critical word
just, as Mr Mill seems to admit he has here done, superfluously and
without meaning ?

200 Just and Unjust.

possible to defend tliem unjustly. As instance already
given, we might defend them most effectively by hanging
innocent people, or poor unhappy maniacs. But to such a
display of social " vigour " Mr Mill would almost certainly
decline to give the sanction of his great name. Consequent-
ly, what he must be held here to mean is, not that our
"just rights" — such of our rights, that is, as do not chance
to be wrongs — "it cannot be unjust to defend" by any
means that may lie to our hand ; but that it cannot be un-
juitt in us to defend them justly. The tautology in the first
clause of the sentence is thus, it seems, of no avail for Mr
Mill's purpose, except in virtue of a suppressed tautology
in the second, too flagrant to be put upon paper. Surely
farther remark is here unnecessary ; the more so, that, as in
the previous case, Mr Mill's own concluding illustration,
already en passant commented on, sufficiently defines his
position. " Free-will or no free-will, it is just to punish
" for protection exactly as it is just to put a wQd beast to
" death for the same object." In this identification, in so
far forth, of the man and the wild beast, there is a ground,
of course, for the announcement of the Brute Imperative ;
but we had thought it was the Moral Imperative which Mr
Mill was engaged in elucidating for us.

' When we said above that the consideration of desert was
throughout evaded by Mr Mill, we were not rigorously ac-
curate. It is touched lightly in one passage, which must be
quoted, otherwise we should be liable to the suspicion of
wilful unfairness to Mr Mill.

' " Now the primitive consciousness we are said to have
" that we are accountable for our actions, and that, if we
"violate the rule of right, we shall deserve punishment, I
"contend is nothing else than our Imowledge that punishment

yustice and Desert. 20 1

"will hejiist; that by such conduct we shall place ourselves
" in the position, in which our fellow- creatures, or the Deity,
" or hoth, wiU naturally, and ma,j justly, inflict punishment
"upon us.''

' Now, what does Mr MiL. mean by Justice, Jiist, &c. 1 We
don't ask what in the course of his discussion he means —
for this is a metaphysical inquiry of quite too subtle and
complex a kind — but what is he bound to mean by the words
as by himself defined in his premises? "The real question
"is one of Justice; the legitimacy of Eetribution." "The
" belief that we are justly accountable ; that guilt deserves
"punishment. It is here that the main issue is joined be-
" tween the two opinions." Just punishment is certainly here
deserved punishment. Also in the note at page 195 we have
elsewhere seen Mr Mill shut himself up to this meaning of
the word ; and if another note to the like effect be needed for
behoof of desert and Eetribution, the reader has it below.'-

' Wherefore, if anywhere in his discussion Mr Mill is found
using the word just, except as including the idea of desert,
unless in doing so he defines the precise shade of difference
in the new meaning intended, he is to be held utterly inex-
cusable, as condescending to use for our bewilderment the
stalest trick of the sophist. Holding Mr Mill, then, strictly
to his own definitions of the word Just, what in effect do
we here find him writing 1 " The consciousness we are said
"to have that we shall deserve punishment, I contend, is

' " Retribution, or evil for evil, becomes closely connected with the
" sentiment of Justice, and is universally included in the idea " (p. 89).
" The principle, therefore, of giving to each what they deserve, that is,
"good for good, evil for evil, is not only included within the idea of
" Justice, as we have defined it, but is a proper object of that inten-
" sity of sentiment which places the Just, in human estimation, above
" the simply Expedient" (p. 90). — Mr Mill's " Utilitarianism."

202 Dilemma.

" nothing more than our knowledge that punishment will
" be deserved ; that our fellow-creatures, &c., may deservedly
" inflict punishment on us." ISTo great need to contend
here ; the most contentious opponent Mr MiU is likely to
encounter will scarcely care to dispute with him as to a de-
served punishment being a deserved one. And now, does
or does not Mr Mill in his argument maintain that " guilt
deserves punishment ? " We profess that after reading Mr
Mill repeatedly with our best care, we do not in the least
know ; and it is even our notion, it might puzzle himself
very much to say whether he does or not. The following
dilemma is proposed to him, in terms of his own initial
statement of the dispute, — If guUt does not deserve punish-
ment, what becomes of his argument for Moral accountability,
as distinguished from the accountability simple, which
merely "means punishment," or the being "made account-
"able"? Plainly it is nowhere; in the "issue joined be-
" tween the two opinions," the one of which holds that,
Freedom apart, Moral Responsibility is without a basis ; the
other, that without Freedom, it is stiU logically to be sub-
stantiated, — the latter, or Mr Mill's opinion, has experienced
ignominious rout, and no longer holds the field. On the
other hand, if a man thoroughly does deserve punishment,
might he not in equity be punished, simply and finally
on that ground, apart from those ulterior ends — " the benefit
" of the offender himself, and the protection of others " —
by which alone punishment, according to Mr Mill, can " on
the Necessitarian, theory be justified " 1 And if not, in what
intelligible sense can he be said to deserve punishment 1
Such are the hopeless difiiculties in which — unless language
is to be emptied of meaning in his favour — Mr Mill has
here contrived to enmesh himself.

yustice and Retribution. 203

'Tedious as it is to track Mr Mill through all his
doublings, and oppressive as the reader may he beginning
to find this part of the subject, it seems necessary to proceed
with it a little. To quote Mr MiU further, — " If any one
" thinks there is justice in the infliction of purposeless suffer-
" ing ; that there is a natural affinity between the two ideas
" of guilt and punishment, which makes it intrinsically
" fitting that wherever there has been guilt, pain should be
" inflicted by way of retribution ; I confess that I can find
" no argument to justify punishment infiicted on this
" principle. As a legitimate satisfaction to feeUngs of
" indignation and resentment, which are on the whole
" salutary, and worthy of cultivation, I can in certain cases
" admit it ; but here it is still a means to an end. The
" merely retributive view of punishment derives no justifica-
" tion from the doctrine I support."

' " The merely retributive view of punishment." But does
not in this word merely — if it be taken to mean anything—
Mr Mill virtually concede a retributive element at least in
punishment ; an evil desert in the culprit, failing of which,
not even as " a means to an end " could we justly visit him
with punishment ? Is not something of the kind implied,
too, in describing as " legitimate '' the " satisfaction to feel-
" ings of indignation" conveyed in the infliction of punish-
ment? and could the satisfaction be held " legitimate," such
punishment being supposed undeserved ? Unless by his
guilt a man deserves punishment, could we justly for our
own ends inflict it? And if guilt be admitted to deserve
punishment, is not this equivalent to an admission of the
" natural affinity between the ideas of guilt and punishment,"
above by Mr MiU denied ? At the same time, while we
contend that the idea of punishment as in any accurate sense

204 Crime for Conscience' sake.

just, is that of punisliment deserved, and as such, in some
strict sense, retributive, " merely retributive Punisliment "
we should perhaps not venture to inflict, except in the in-
dulgence of personal passion, or strong sympathy v?ith such
in others. Othervrise, no more than Mr MiU can we " find
"argument to justify it." Even when clearly convinced of
its justiae, we might yet shrink from it as unjustifiable, on
the general principle of humanity, which forbids " the in-
" fliction of purposeless suffering." Mr Mill's point of view
here is that of every Christian moralist. The " vengeance
" is mine, I wiU repay," peremptorily forbids the infliction
of punishment, even in equity due, when there is not a con-
currence of social ends to be served by it, with that evil
desert of the offender, which constitutes the punishment a
just one.

' Finally, Mr Mill thus rids himself of the subject of Jus-
tice, in a passage which, whatever his previous success in it
may be, he plainly holds to clinch his argument (p. 512).
" I ask any one who thinks that the justice of punishment
" is not suf&eiently vindicated by its being for the protection
" of just rights, how he reconciles his sense of justice to the
" punishment of crimes committed in obedience to a pervert-
" ed conscience 1 Eavaillac and Balthasar Gerard did not
" regard themselves as criminals but as heroic martyr^. If
" they were justly put to death, the justice of punishment
" has nothing to do with the state of mind of the offender,
" further than as this may affect the efficacy of punishment
" as a means to its end. If that is not a justification, there
" is no justification. All other imaginary justifications
" break down in their application to this particular case.''

' Apart from Mr MUl's habitual confusion of the different
shades of meaning of the word Just, and its cognates. Jus-

Rationale of its Punishment. 205

tice, Justify, &c., there seems nothing here which to an an-
tagonist of Mr Mill needs present the smallest difficulty.
As to " crimes committed in ohedience to a perverted con-
" science," it seems sufficient ,to say that we consider them
justly (or deservedly) punished as so committed; we hold
the felon responsible for his crime, if not immediately per-
haps, yet mediately as culpable in the perversion of his
conscience which led to it, in so far as this may fairly be
surmised to have emerged under the conditions of sanity.
Of assassins who " regard themselves not as criminals but
" as heroic martyrs," we may boldly say that could we have
positive assurance that their outrage of the obligation to re-
spect life was solely an act of self-sacrifice to what they con-
sidered a higher and more sacred one, however, on obvious
grounds of general expediency, we might acquiesce in the
doom awarded them, the justice of it as deserved or due to
their deed, considered in itself, and as an isolated act, we
should very peremptorDy deny. JusUfiahle we should call
it in the general, not just in the particular instance. Take
the stock case of Brutus — his purity of motive unim-
peached — who, inasmuch as he did not love Csesar less, but
Eome more, struck through his own heart at the murderer
of his country's freedom ; of Charlotte Corday, who smote
the monster Marat ! To deeds like these — except that " the
" godlike stroke " of Brutus seems a little perhaps too god-
like — humanity throbs for evermore approval. What of
such cases 1 Was Charlotte Corday "justly put to death,"
in the sense that she deserved her doom % Mr MiU will not
say so. Justijiahly, however, from the legal point of view,
she was, if to the ruffianly faction then dominant it be pro-
per to ascribe legality. Generally, in such cases, while we
may doubt if it be morally just (deserved) that the particular

2o6 Rationale of its Punishment.

hero should suffer for what may really have heen an act of
sublime virtue, his punishment may yet seem justifiahle to
us, on the ground that such ■whimsical heroes are inconveni-
ent, inasmuch as no society could afford to grow a succession
of them. A dubious point of justice — dubious, because
the true motive of the act must always remain obscure —
may here be allowed to be over-ridden by a plain and potent
mandate of expediency. Further, a judicial and punitive
sy-ftem can only deal on general rules laid down, with overt
act, and can take no account whatever of the motives and
'' state of mind of the offender.'' But has justice, therefore,
as Mr Mill alleges, " nothing to do with the state of mind
" of the offender " 1 That it is not so, is obvious from the one
exception to these general rules, which in every humane
judicial system is made in favour of the maniac. His " state
" of mind " is most carefully taken into account ; and if it
be not on a ground of justice that it is so, on what ground
is if? Mr Mill wiU find it hard to explain. His saving
clause, " further than as this (his state of mind) may affect
" the efficacy of punishment as a means to its end," is here,
of course, of no avail. For how should the state of mind of
the maniac, as unamenable to motive, any way affect the
efficacy of our hanging him for murder, as a means to deter
others from murder? Not surely — for anything it will
make in Mr Mill's favour — by directing the sympathies of
the public against the law and in favour of its victim ; for
what is to be assigned as the ground of this supposed public
sympathy and abhorrence 1 Plainly nothing but a sense of
the brutal injustice of hanging a man, " the state of whose
" mind " fatally determined him to crime. Yet unques-
tionably, rotating on the rope as an example, he would
be as edifying as the most perfect sanity could make him ;

Rationale of its Punishment. 207

and were expediency only considered, to be rid of the
pernicious confusions in whicli we are of late involved,
we should begin to hang madmen to-morrow. But the
sense of justice to the poor wretches, as not after all deserv-
ing to be hanged, which at first procured their exemption
from the rope, will probably be strong enough to perpetu-
ate it, even against a very strong plea of social utility as
outraged. That "the justice of punishment has nothing
" to do with the state of mind of the offender," ^ is a, dictum
which Mr MiU may profitably revise, in the light of this
significant exception. If in other cases we take no account
of " the state of mind of the offender," it is because we are
utterly incapable of doing so with any approach to scientific
accuracy, and because criminal legislation can only proceed
on a general rule of particular penalties attached to par-
ticular acts. But not unfrequently it may happen that to
a punishment which is justified under the general rule, we
can with difiSculty reconcile ourselves as just in the indivi-
dual instance. And this, because though legally we cannot,
unavoidably as men we do, regard the " state of mind of
" the offender " as determining the character of his crime,
and more or less affecting our estimate of the amount of
punishment due to it, or, in the special case, just.

' But all this time has Mr Mill been so juggling with
Justice without some dim sense of what he is doing t Not
so ; in the midst of his dexterous legerdemain, a sudden
suspicion seems to emerge in his mind that all is not quite
as it should be, and his attempt to escape from the entangle-
ment in which he finds himself, is, in the mode of it, even
more lamentable than was the entanglement itself After
reducing, as we have seen, " the primitive consciousness we
1 As to all this, see apraiii Section VI. in externa.

2o8 Mr Mill's Postulate of Reality.

" are said to have that we are acoountahle, and that if we
" violate the rule of right we shall deserve punishment, to
" nothing else than our knowledge that punishment will be
"just," by which he really means no more than that it will
" naturally follow ; " though " will naturally and ma,j Justly
" follow" are of course the terms used, a little qualm seems
to strike him, and he says, — " By using the word justly, I
" am not assuming in the explanation the thing I profess
" to explain. As before observed, I am entitled to postulate
" the reality, and the knowledge and feeling of moral dis-
" tinotions. These, it is both evident metaphysically, and
" notorious historically, are independent of any theory con-
" cerning the will." Had we, in this connection, met with
the above on the page of an unknown writer, we should
have held it to indicate the most radical philosophic incom-
petence. Philosophers would have easy times of it if we
allowed them quietly to postulate the very things they un-
dertake to prove. If Mr Mill's present chapter be not in
its main scope an attempt, on the hypothesis of Necessity,
to prove " the reality of moral distinctions," as involved in
human responsibility, failing of which man cannot be a
moral creature, of whose acts such distinctions are predicable,
we will, with any sauce or none, eat his entire discussion.
That on the scheme of unconditional Necessity, as including
human actions, moral qualities can no longer, except fictiti-
ously, be attributed to them ; and that thus " moral distinc-
tions," however practically accepted, must needs be iUusory,
not real — what if not this is the objection urged by the
advocates of Freedom against Mr Mill's doctrine 1 Could
Mr Mill himself state the objection, save implicitly in these
terms ? Except by ingeniously mis-stating it, he could not ;
yet in answer to the objection, he considers himself " en-

The very thing to be proved. 209

" titled to postulate the reality of moral distinctions." We
venture to question his title to do so. " As I have before
" observed, I am entitled," he says ; but even in this he is
mistaken ; nothing that he has before observed amounts to
any claim to be so entitled. The reference in his " before
observed" can only be to two passages. The one is that
important one already quoted, in which, seeking to make
sun-clear to us the " distinction between moral good and
" evil in conduct," he considered he succeeded in doing so
by abolishing all moral agency ; the other is a passage in
which he says, that for the present argument, it is no matter
what "criterion of moral distinctions,'' utilitarian or other-
wise, is assumed. In the first of these, he asserts that " the
" highest and strongest sense of the worth of goodness, and
" the odiousness of its opposite, is compatible with even
" the most exaggerated form of Fatalism ; " in the other he
" says, " it is sufficient if we Idieve there is a difference be-
" tween right and wrong." The "feeling (sense) of moral
" distinctions," and " the knowledge " of them — if he
chooses to call it a knowledge, rushing into those confusions
of knowledge and belief of which he seeks to convict Sir
W. Hamilton — he has thus, in his previous observations,
entitled himself to postulate. And these he is welcome to
postulate ; but the reality of moral distinctions is quite an-
other affair. That, in the scheme of the Necessitarian, moral
feeUngs and beliefs — 'since nobody questions their existence
— may logically be assumed as involved in the all-including
Necessity, we are frankly ready to admit ; we shall further
admit as involved in it the conviction in the mind of Mr
MiU that between a belief and the validity of a belief, as
vouching the reality of the thing believed, there is no distinc-
tion whatever; but this last part of the Necessity seems for

2 1 o Reality of Moral Distinctions.

Mr Mill an unhappy one. We had thought a mere belief
could prove nothing beyond itself ; that even if it were one
of Sir W. Hamilton's " natural beliefs," it was scarce even
therein proved natural. Now, it seems, nous avons change
tout cela, and beliefs are to be put in the witness-box as evi-
dence to their own character. Whether does Mr Mill, from
the lelipf in moral distinctions, find so sure an inference of
their reality as seems to entitle him to postulate it, or has
he of that reality an absolute intellectual intuition 1 We
should be curious indeed to be informed. It seems to us
that to clutch at it in the latter way would be quite as con-
sonant with his general scheme of thought as to try to arrive
at it in the other. In one sense, however — let him reach it
in what way he pleases — Mr MiU does wisely and well to
postulate the reality of moral distinctions, as without some-
thing of this surreptitiously implied in the words just, justly,
&c., when in truth their meaning as used excludes it, he is
really without an argument. In another sense, he cannot
be held to do quite so well, inasmuch as the trick is quite
too transparent ; so that, for any but the dullest reader, his
dexterous manipulation of terms is vain as the art of the
thimble-rigger when the dupes have discovered his mystery.
As to the " evident metaphysically that the reality of moral
" distinctions is independent of any theory concerning the
" will," what is to us metaphysically evident in the matter,
is that precisely tliis it is, which Mr MUl is engaged in try-
ing to prove, not, as we think, with highly-distinguished
success.^ Suppose, again, it were " notorious historically "

1 [That if moral distinctions do exist as real, no mere theory about
the "Will, or about anything else, can annihilate, or make them un-
real, is of course uncommonly obvious. But Mr Mill cannot surely
mean to enunciate so bald a truism as this— that if a thing veritably

Punishment Retributive 2 1 1

— as to a certain extent it is — that tlie " knowledge (belief)
" and feeling of moral distinctions are independent of any
" theory," what is this to Mr Mill's purpose % It is also, we
suppose, " notorious historically " that the extreme specula-
tive idealist, who regards the external world as an illusion
merely, does not therefore endanger his supersubtle brain
by plunging his head against walls. He practically believes
in the wall as having a most serious external existence,
though speculatively he admits it as nothing but an idea of
his own absurd mind. And as against Mr Mill it is con-
tended that in the scheme of Necessity, consistently de-
veloped, our moral belief is precisely in analogous case ;
however practically urgent, it must speculatively be volati-
lised into a lying illusion of life; the "moral Imperative"
can only be recognised as a mendacious, but not the less it
may remain an efficient Imperative.

' When Mr Mill, having defined " the real question as one
" of Justice — the legitimacy of Eetribution or Punishment,''
proceeds from his premiss of Necessity — with what success
we have seen — to substantiate the idea of Justice by prov-
ing the legitimacy of Punishment, either he has stated the
question in terms of most serious inaccuracy, or he must be
held to be proving, along with this, the legitimacy of Eetri-
bution ; for if in his formula — " Eetribution or Punish-
ment " — the words be not used as interchangeable, it can
only be becaiise Mr Mill is an indifferent writer of English.

is, we cannot, by any mere theorising of ours, make it not to lei
What he must mean is, that the " reality of moral distinctions is in-
dependent of theory, " in the sense that it is speculatively reconcilable
with the Necessitarian theory of the Will, no less than with that of
Freedom. And this, which is coolly assumed as "metaphysically
evident," is plainly the very thing of which we were entitled to de-
mand proof of him.]

212 And Reformatory.

But the sole punishment his reasoning legitimates, is pun-
ishment reformatory and deterrent; and of retributive
punishment we hear nothing except towards the close of
this part of the discussion, when Mr Mill in an easy way
informs us he " can find no argument to justify it." Not
the less, ho^vever, in terms of his own statement, he stood
bound to find argument to justify it ; and till we came with
some surprise on his disclaimer, we confess we had thought
he was trying to do so, though he did not seem much to
succeed. The disclaimer, when it comes, is well ; but mean-
time, for careless readers — who are greatly, we fear, in the
majority — Mr Mill's unquestionable success in legitimating
punishment, interpolated as ground of motive, has seemed
to involve its legitimacy when inflicted as also retribution ;
and even when the disclaimer is tendered, they mayn't, per-
haps, appreciate its full force as confounding the whole
previous argument. We would not for the world hint such
a thing of Mr Mill ; but in a writer presumed capable of it,
we might almost have been disposed to suspect here a little
dishonesty of artifice. Moreover, as we before noted, had
Mr Mill applied to the subject, as defined in his own words,
the least of his usual rigour, " Eetribution," being thrown
overboard, " Justice " alike and " Punishment " should have
been cast out along with it, and instantly " the real ques-
tion " would have been no longer question at all to tax Mr
Mill's ingenuity.

' Of artifice or subterfuge of any kind we hold Mr Mill in-
capable ; but throughout he has been led by the exigencies
of an attempt, in its very nature now and for ever a hope-
less one, into something perilously like it. Eecurring to
his definition of Moral Eesponsibility — " when we are said
" to have the feeling of being morally responsible for our

Mr Mill's confusion of these. 2 ] 3

" actions, the idea of heing punished for them is uppermost
" in the s]Deaker's mind " — it is obvious to remark, as before
noted, that " the idea of punishment being uppermost " im-
plies some correlative idea as undermost in the mind of said
speaker. Yet, in the discussion which follows, this under-
most, plainly implied, finds no recognition whatever. The
uppermost exclusively has place in it, and the " Eesponsi-
" bility means punishment," which defines the simpAe Re-
sponsibility, is made to do duty throughout as if it had de-
fined the moral one. In this way Mr MiU's argument
succeeds beautifully. " Responsibility means punishment ;"
— and Mr Mill, finding it easy to exhibit a pretty little
schema of thought, justifying, on the principle of necessitated
action by motive, the infliction of punishment as furnishing
a motive, of course he proves his case ; Necessity and Re-
sponsibility are no longer incompatible, as they were held to
be ; Mr Mill has prospered to a wish in the mixing of his
oil and water. But if, on the other hand, " Responsibility
" means punishment," which suggests the simple Imperative,
is inadequate to suggest the Moral one, it may very well be
that though the fluids have been by Mr Mill most vigorously
shaken together, their interfusion is semblant only, and may
presently be proved to be so, by the obstinate re-emergence
of the oil. And precisely this is the case. If Moral Re-
sponsibility means not punishment simpliciter, but punish-
ment in some sense retributive ; and if, with " the idea of
" being punished upipermost " — since Mr Mill will have it
so — beneath and bound up with this idea is the sense of
heixig jtistly punished, of deserving to be punished, Mr Mill's
whole argument collapses. And that such is the accurate
statement of the case — that our feelings of good desert in a
good deed, of evil desert in an evil one, are of the intimate

2 14 Failure of Mr Mill's argument.

essence of Moral Eesponsibility, no sane creature -will deny,
save here and there, perhaps a philosopher. Mr Mill him-
self will scarce deny it ; for did not we find him remark
that "not the belief that we shall be made accountable, but
" the belief that we ought so to be, that we are justly ac-
" countable, that guilt deserves punishment, can be deemed
" to require or jpresuppose the Free-will hypothesis " ? This,
therefore, is the Eesponsibility, by Mr Mill himself given
as the fact of consciousness, to furnish a rational basis of
which his adversaries " deem it needful to presuppose
"Freedom;" and this, by consequence, it plainly was,
which the rigour of the debate required Mr Mill to con-
stitute for us, under his prescribed conditions of jSTecessity.
His utter failure to do so, to the extent of having in the end
to admit — after trying to bubble us with a discourse on
Punishment Eeformatory and Deterrent, quite futde and
beside the "real question" — that "for any natural affinity
" between the two ideas of guilt and punishment he can
" find no argument," is perhaps the severest misfortune
which ever befell a logician of Mr Mill's admitted eminence.'

[I should be in the last degree disingenuous, if in repro-
ducing my discussion as above, I did not produce, at the
same time, Mr Mill's unfavourable criticism of it at one
particular point.

" The chapter in which I have discussed this question
" ( Utilitarianism, Chap. F.)is quite familiar to Mr Alexander,
" -who shows himself extremely well acquainted loith all parts
" of it,^ except those ivhich tell against his oun side. Even

' Mr Mill's little compliment here — though indeed there is some-
thing more serious than a banter with it_to some extent takes the
sting for me out of his scorn insinuated in the next paragraph :—
" How far Mr Alexander understands the first elements of the ethical
"system which he denounces, is shown," &c. &c.

Criticism by Mr Mill. 215

" when he accomplishes (pp. 52 and 59 — here pp. 195 and
" 201) the great feat of finding in it the two statements, that
" justice, in the general mind has a great deal to do with the
" notion of desert, and that justice is not synonymous with
" expediency, no one who reads him would suspect I had ex-
" plained in the same chapter, what in my view the notion
" of desert is, and what there is in our idea of justice be-
" sides expediency. Mr Alexander's perpetual insinuations,
" and more than insinuations of had faith " (to this I have
abeady adverted), " since he makes a kind of retractation
" of their grossest meaning in one line of his essay, I par-
" don, as one of the incidents of his rollicking style ; but it
" is weU that he should be aware how easy, if any one were
" disposed, it would be to retaliate them."

Mr Mill's accusation against me here is precisely of the
same kind as that treated of at pp. 25, 26. As I there frankly
admitted misapprehension of Mr Mill, and unfairness un-
intentionally involved in that, here I should frankly do the
same, if I could see it with the same clearness. But frankly
I must say I do not. My quotations from Mr Mill, in aid
of my argument, were made in the most perfect hona fides ;
and I am unable at this moment to see that my use of them
was illegitimate. E"or would it perhaps have been easy for
Mr Mill to prove that it was so, though to imply or in-
sinuate so much could not of course be difficult (is it need-
ful to say that in the use of the word insinuate here I in-
tend no evil insinuation).]

: 1 6 Hume, Clarke, and Reid.

Note Yil.—See p. 90.

In making Hume answerable for this argument, that in
the light of the principle of Causation, the first is the only
efficient, and therefore the only responsible cause, I cannot
in strictness he held correct, seeing he states it only as a
possible objection to be replied to. With Dr Samuel Clarke,
it was much a favourite, and under the form of assertion,
that a necessary agent is not an agent at all — -the very
phrase involving, as he insists, a contradiction in terms — it
perpetually recurs in his writings on this very pet topic
with him. He rather, however, with ponderous iteration,
keeps hurling it at the heads of antagonists, than anywhere,
that I remember, takes pains to develop it as a clear pro-
position of reason ; so that a reader who does not bring the
meaning with him, so to speak, might readily enough fail to
find it. And the lucidity which the argument but indiffer-
ently attained in the hands of Clarke, it does not attain in
those of Eeid, who makes cool ' conveyance' of it, without
any show of exposition. It might almost seem that he
uses it at second-hand, in a puzzled kind of way, as a safe
thing to say, Clarke having said it so often, and plainly
putting such stead upon it. I do not in this intend dis-
respect to Eeid ; but it is simply the truth of him, that
nearly throughout, in his treatment of this subject, he blun-
ders almost as- dreadfully on the one side, as, more lately.

Hitmes Statement of Objectio7is. 2 1 7

Mr Mill has contrived to do on the other. Li Hume, on
the other hand, who, at the close of his Essay on the sub-
ject, admits in this argument an ' objection,' which he sees
may be taken to his doctrine, we find it very skilfully de-
veloped, under forms of logical statement.

' It may be said,' he writes, ' that if voluntary actions be
* subjected to the same laws of necessity with the opera-
' tions of matter, there is a continued chain of necessary
' causes, preordained and predetermined, reaching from
' the original cause of all to every single volition of every
' human creature. No contingency anywhere in the universe ;
' no indifference ; no liberty. While, we act, we are at the
' same time acted upon. The ultimate author of all our
' volitions is the Creator of the woi~ld, who first bestowed
' motion on this immense machine, and placed all beings in
' that particular position, whence every subsequetit event, by
' an inevitable necessity, must result. Human actions, there-
' fore, either can have no moral turpitude at all, as proceed-
' iug from so good a cause ; or if they have any turpitude,
' they must involve our Creator in the same guilt, while He
' is acknowledged to be their ultimate cause and author.
' Tor as a man who fired a mine is answerable for all the
' consequences, whether the train he employed be long or
' short ; so wherever a continued chain of necessary causes is
'fixed, that being either finite or i^ifinite who produces the
' first, is likeioise author of all the rest, and must both bear
' the blame and acquire the praise which belong to them.
' Our clear and unalterable ideas of morality establish this
' rule, upon unquestionable reasons, when we examine the
' consequences of any human action ; and these reasons must
' still have greater force when applied to the volitions and
' intentions of a Being infinitely wise and powerful. Ignor-

2i8 To which he fails to reply.

' ance or impotence may he pleaded for so limited a creature
' as man ; but those imperfections can Lave no place in
' our Creator. He foresaw, He ordained, He intended all
' those actions of men which we so rashly pronounce crimi-
' nal. And we must therefore conclude, either that they are
' not criminal, or that the Deity, not man, is accountable for
' them. Eut as either of these positions is absurd and im-
' pious, it follows that the doctrine from which they are de-
' duced cannot possibly be true, as being liable to aU the
' same objections. An absurd consequence, if necessary,
' proves the original doctrine to be absurd ; , in the same
' manner as criminal actions render criminal the original
' cause, if the connection between them be necessary and
' inevitable.'

One has so often pitied a poor parson, who, having stated
a sceptical objection, found himself quite at a loss to dispose
of it to the satisfaction of his least instructed listener, that
it is pleasant to find the great sceptic himself here at
somewhat a similar nonplus. To the objection thus stated
by Hume with his wonted incomparable force and clearness,
he utterly fails in his attempt to furnish a reply.

' This objection,' he says, availing himself of the theolo-
gical turn he has dexterously contrived to give it, ' consists
' of two parts, which we shall examine separately ; First
' — that if human actions can be traced up, by a necessary
' chain, to the Deity, they can never be criminal ; on ac-
' count of the infinite perfection of, that Being from whom
' they are derived, and who can intend nothing but what is
' altogether good and laudable. Or, secondly — if they be
' criminal, we must retract the attribute of perfection which
' we ascribe to the Deity, and must acknowledge Him to be
' the ultimate author of guilt and moral turpitude in all His

His Reply merely evasive. 219

' creatures.' To tlie first part of tlie objection, he gives a
reply so utterly unspeoulative as this ^ — that the moral, as
' natural sentiments of the human mind, are not to he con-
' trolled or altered by any philosophical theory or specula-
' tion whatsoever.' To the second part of the objection he
admits that he can give no answer ; that ' these are mysteries
' which mere natural and unassisted reason is very unfit to
' handle;' and that he, no more than his predecessors, can
' defend absolute decrees, and yet free the Deity from
' being the author of sin.' Meantime, what of the objection,
as urged on the human ground, with which only we are
competent to deal % This he sharply sees, as shown in the
clause ' impotence may be pleaded for so limited a creature
as man ; ' and, as quite too acute to delude himself with the
flimsy sophistries which satisfy Mr Mill and others, sees

1 The irrelevancy of this reply Hume contrives rather cleverly to
conceal, by dropping it, in an easy way, at the close of a page or two
of somewhat abstruse illustrative discussion — of discussion elaborately
needless. Wot the less it is plainly irrelevant. The objection (which
would scarcely in this form have occurred to any one but himself) is,
that if God, assumed infinitely good, be really the author of so-styled
criminal actions, it can only be ' rashly ' and inaccurately that we so
style them, because to impute badness to them would be to impeach
the goodness in the divine cause of them assumed. Is it any answer
to this reasoning to allege — for it amounts to this — that whether or no it
is good reasoning, by the very constitution of our nature we are inevi-
tably determined to impute criminality to such actions ? Would Hume
have elsewhere admitted the validity of such an answer ; and on the
ground that our natural belief in matter ' is not to be altered or con-
' trolled ' by the sceptical speculation which discredits it, have con-
sented to dismiss the speculation as such, as worthless and unper-
mitted ? Not so, of course — any more than Mr Mill, admitting, as he
does, that ' throughout the whole of our sensitive life, we unquestion-
' ably refer our sensations to me and a not-me,' would proceed to ad-
mit further, that on this ground, his resolution of the Not-me into
mere ' possibilities of sensation ' was proved to be futile and absurd.

2 20 His Reply an Evasion.

also that he cannot answer it, and coolly gives it the go-hy.
If 'for a creature limited like man impotence may be
pleaded ' — impotence to act save in the one way predeter-
mined for him ; if our acting is in truth a ' being acted on ; '
if we are not ' the authors of our own volitions,' the ' ultimate
cause and author of which ' is the first cause, who ' must
both bear the blame and acquire the praise which belong to
them,' — on what ground can we apportion that praise and
blame to man, whose good actions are thus, in a manner,
forced upon him, for whose bad actions 'impotence to do
otherwise may be pleaded ' % To this form of the objection,
the really pressing one, which will at once suggest itself, as
such, to every reader of Hume's statement, he attempts no
reply ; he is careful to avoid even stating it, and escapes by
a theological evasion, as we see. So transparent is the
evasion, that only my profound respect for the character of
Hume as a man — and surely he was one of the most admir-
able of men — prevents me from surmising that, as an evasion,
he must have been himself aware of it. Certainly my re-
spect for him as a thinker would lead me to suppose he
mtmt have been. As, however, while deprecating the way
in which assumed moral results of doctrine are frequently
used, not so properly to disprove the doctrine as ' only to
make the person of an antagonist odious,' he avows himself
willing ' frankly to submit to an examination of this kind,'
I should shrink from supposing his frankness merely assumed.
aS^o more than against Mr Mill anywhere, would I permit
myself here to insinuate against Hume, a loilful intellectual
obliquity. Yet no more palpable shirking of the real and
pressing point of an opponent's objection, than that of which .
Hume is here guilty, is anywhere, I believe, to be found.
Mr Mill in his Logic, when engaged in developing his

In Causation no Must or Compulsion. 2 2 r

' true doctrine of Moral Causation,' says, that wliile it can-
not surprise him that ' free-will philosophers, being mostly
' of the school which rejects Hume's analysis of Cause and
' Effect, should miss their way for want of the light which
' that analysis affords,' it is a matter of some ' wonder ' to
him ' that the Necessitarians, who usually admit that philo-
' sophical theory, should in practice equally lose sight of it.'
It seems probable that Hume understood, in all its bearings,
his own doctrine of Causation as thoroughly as Mr Mill can
do ; and it is made nothing less than certain by his signifi-
cant clause, ' for such a limited creature as man impotence
may be pleaded,' that he would simply have laughed to scorn
the use which Mr MiU has made of it in relation to the
moral problem. The logical distinction, in this relation,
between a causal compulsion to act so, and an utter,i admitted,
causal inahility to act othenmse, he left it for Mr MiU to
discover; and I don't think that, could he have foreseen it,
he would have much envied Mr Mill his discovery. It is
a great point with Mr Mill, that as Causation is nothing
but ' invariable sequence,' it involves no ' peculiar tie, or
' mysterious constraint exercised by the antecedent over
' the consequent ; ' there is, therefore, no must in the matter ;
no such compulsion as, in the use of the word Necessity, he
accuses the assailants of his doctrine of insinuating as
essential for their argument. Mr MUl thus, in denying
Freedom, equally denies compidsiofi ; and this distinction
between his doctrine and that of Necessity, as interpreted
by his opponents, he holds to be fruitful in ethical results,

1 I aasutne the inability admitted, from the point of view of the
Causationist ; though of course Causationists like Mill, who believe
that they can ' help ' their actions, may decline to admit it, if they
please.

2 2 2 Importance in a Practical Aspect.

and ' of supreme importance in a practical aspect.' The
distinction seems to resolve itself into that between being
compelled to go to a particular place, and being utterly with-
out power to stay away from it. As, whichever way of it
we suppose, the man inevitahly finds himself at the place,
the difference ' in a practical aspect,' a mind as subtle as that
of Mr Mill is required in order to perceive. That a distinc-
tion so frivolous as that announced, between being causally
compelled to act so, and, as under the law of Causation, be-
ing utterly without power to act otherwise, Mr MOl should
have passed off upon himself as of supreme ethical import,
and contrived, by the weight of his authority, to impose
upon the minds of others — very notably on such a mind as
that of the ' illustrious historian and philosopher ' ^ who re-
viewed him so kindly in the Westminstei — must be held in
the last degree surprising. Surely if we can't heljj doing a
thing, it is quite as inevitable we should do it, as any causal
compulsion could make it ; and the negative of impotence
admitted, not less than the positive compulsion denied, is
seen to bear with crushing force on the integrity of the moral
nature. To my observations somewhat to this effect Mr MiU
has vouchsafed no reply ; nor has he to a series of further
remarks on this part of the subject, which, for complete-
ness' sake, I may as well briefly resume.

I suppose Mr Mill would admit that the word compul-
sion has a meaning ; and the thing an actual existence.
Suppose that, on the eve of an important division, at which
Mr MUl stood pledged to his constituents to be in his place
in Parliament, he was clutched hold of (presumably by Tory
conspirators), tied to the tail of a cart-horse, and dragged
off to Eichmond. Except by announcing and denouncing
1 Vide Mr Mill's Preface, 3d edition.

Argu7nentu7n ad Hominem. 223

a plain raiist here, a manifestfelonious compulsion, how ever
would Mr Mill succeed in excusing himself when called to
account for his absence ? Yet here there is plainly nothing
hut a simple case of Causation, defined by Mr Mill as
merely 'invariable sequence.' The horse moves on as cause
or antecedent; Mr Mill as consequent, or effect, follows.
The ' tie ' is not indeed ' mysterious ' j it is simply some
yard or so of hemp; yet it suffices — nolens volens, the
philosopher finds himself progressing towards Eichmond.
Let us hope that he improves the time by meditating on
Hume's Theory of Causation. In the material under his
observation, he has advantages which Hume did not find in
his billiard-baUs. Almost it might seem, that while from
the point of view of a disembodied spirit surveying the
mutations of matter, nothing could ever be obvious to sense
save invariable sequences of change ; and between the cause
and its effect no relation could thus be discovered save that
of constant antecedence and consequence — no nexus, as it is
usually termed — a very slight experiment of the kind sug-
gested on that portion of the material world, with which, as
our own bodies, relations are established in consciousness,
does seem to afford us a perception of something of the sort
— of a veritable power in the cause to control or produce the
e^ect. Were the world merely a spectacle for us — as Hume
figures it with his bOliard-balls — of horses constantly pro-
gressing towards Richmond, and parliamentary philosophers
following them, we might not perhaps be able to arrive at
■ this, or at anything beyond a generalisation of experience,
to the effect that when horses progress, invariably the phil-
osophers tied to them follow. But so soon as the experi-
ment is made in corpore vili — meaning one's own body as
distinguished from that of a philosopher — in the sense of

2 24 A Practical Must or Compulsion.

resistance overcome, of force exerted from within, and suc-
cumbing to an external superior force, we seem to have a
guarantee of something considerahly beyond a mere invaria-
bility of sequence. That from ever so much experience of
the fact as it occurs, there is valid inference for us of power
in a strong horse to drag after it a weak philosopher, is, I
am aware, a sufficiently audacious surmise — such is the
weight of philosophical authority which can be put into the
scale against it. I by no means confidently assert so hazard-
ous a proposition ; only with the diffidence proper in regard
of a subject which has perplexed so many of the sagest
heads, I venture to hint the loose suggestion as it occurs, that
possibly from our consciousness in being reluctantly dragged
by the horse, as also perhaps from the consciousness of the
horse, if we could get at it, there is fairly some such inference.
All this is, however, beside the question at issue here with
Mr Mill, which may thus be brought to a point. Given any
case of clear and admitted compulsion, torture it as he will,
Mr Mill will be able to find in it nothing but a simple case
of physical causation. In one large class of cases of Causa-
tion, therefore, a practical must or compulsion is admitted.
On what ground does Mr Mill in other cases deny it 1 Mr
Mill cannot surely intend ' to announce one doctrine of
' Causation for gentlemen under constraint, and another for
' gentlemen at large.' Yet either this, or a vigorous dog-
matic denial of any such thing as compulsion as anywhere
existing in the universe, Mr Mill seems bound to announce.
Such is my confidence in Mr Mill's powers of denial, in any
case in which an affirmation would be fatal to a cherished
theory, that T venture to predict he will embrace this latter
alternative. Should he do so in his next edition, it might
be well for him to expunge, among others, the following

Hiime — Mill and Hamilton. 225

passage, so fatal to him otherwise, as we have seen : — ' Yes ;
' if he really " could not help " acting as he did ; that is, if
' it did not depend upon his will ; if he was under physical
' constraint, or under the action of such a violent motive
' that no fear of punishment could have any effect ; which,
' if capable of being ascertained, is a just ground of exemp-
' tion, and is the reason why, by the laws of most countries,
' people are not punished for what they were corrvpdled to
' do by immediate danger of death.'

As Hume has here been under consideration, together
with Mr Mill's relations to him, it may be well to say, in a
word, that in regard of the question at issue about him be-
tween Mr Mill and Hamilton (in the last rather elaborate
Note to Mr Mill's concluding Chapter), on the clear evidence
of Mr HiU Burton's excellent Life of Hume, the balance of
accuracy in appreciation is distinctly on Sir W. Hamilton's
side. Hamilton's notion of Hume is, that his position is
that of the merely intellectual sceiptic, who, taking — pro-
visionally — his premises from the current philosophy of his
time, calmly deduced the results, and said — TJiere ! this is
what your vaunted Eeason leads us to. Mr Mill's notion,
on the other hand, is, that Hume, in all seriousness, ' ac-
cepted the premises at once, and the conclusion ; ' that his
position was not so properly that of the sceptic, as of the
dogmatist in positive unbelief, who ' preferred being called
a sceptic to coming under a more odious title.' Quite plainly
Mr Mill has not read Mr Burton's Life of Hume. If he
wiU a little carefully do so, he wiU find conclusive evidence
in many passages, that lie it is — and not Hamilton, as mean-
time he surmises — who has 'misunderstood the essential char-
acter of Hume's mind.' The subject cannot well be here
discussed or even entered upon. If Mr Mill will be good
P

2 26 Mr Mill remitted to his Studies.

enough, in the interim, to glance into this Life of Hume, I
think it not unlikely that this ' Note' will, in his Fourth Edi-
tion, be withdrawn. Should it be retained, it will be easy to
show that, in retaining it, Mr Mill has done injustice alike
to Hamilton, to Hume, and to himself. Hume was certainly
no Christian ; but unquestionably he was a sound — though
perhaps not fervid — Theist ; and, always a little short of
Christianity — curiosities of dialectic apart, which to himself
seemed not much more than such — believed pretty much as
other people do.

[In writing as above of the evidence furnished by Mr
Burton's ' Life,' as to Hume's real views and philosophical
attitude, I trusted to my memory of the book, and the general
impression it had left on my mind after more than one
perusal. On recurring to the volumes with a view to ascer-
tain, so far as may be, the exact state of the matter (and
this, in reopening the subject, I considered it imperative I
should do), I find that the case, as against Mr Mill, is not
quite so strong as I had supposed it. It remains, however,
I think, strong enough to bear statement, and I place it
in detail before my readers accordingly ; as, in point of fact,
I was bound to do, or failing this, frankly retire from my
previous over-confident deliverance.

As regards Hume's real and private belief, I have said
that ' unquestionably he was a sound— though perhaps not
fervid — Theist;' and if this can be clearly made out, it
will follow that his scepticism, though genuine, was merely
intellectual or speculative, and that he, in his own person,
by no means accepted in full the negative results to which
it led. He did not in that case ' accept the conclusions,'
as Mr Mill surmises, while ' accepting the premises,' as he

Hti,me a Theist. 227

found them in the current philosophy of his time. The
evidence from the book, of Hume's Theism, is not quite
so strong as I had thought it ; but perhaps, if candidly-
weighed, it may suffice. I give the items of evidence, as
they occur in the book, seriatim : —

1. (Vol. i. p. 162.)— Letter to William Muir of Caldwell, re-
garding a sermon of a certain Dr Leechman, of which Hume's
opinion had been asked. ' As to the argument,' he writes, 'I
' could wish Mr Leechman would, in the second edition,
' answer this objection both to devotion and prayer, andindeed
' to everything we commonly call religion, except the practice
' of morality, and the assent of the understanding to the pro-
' position that God exists.' This might almost seem to imply
that whilst other objections are urged to ' everything we com-
monly call religion,' the q_uestions of practical morality and
the existence of God are expressly set aside as adjusted in
Hume's own mind, and not, so far as he is concerned, to be
proposed as matter of controversy. He then proceeds : ' It
' must be acknowledged that nature has given us a strong
' passion of admiration for whatever is excellent, and of
' love and gratitude for whatever is benevolent and bene-
' ficial, and that the Deity possesses these attributes in the
< highest perfection ; and yet, I assert He is not the natural
' object of any passion or affection. He is no object of
' either the senses or the imagination,' &c. It is not
necessary to quote the sceptical reasonings which follow,
however in themselves of interest. What we are here con-
cerned with is Hume's clear implication at first, and clear
enunciation afterwards, of his Theistic belief. It is to be
admitted, however, that there is really not very much in
this. Hume, as writing for behoof of a cleric, might think
that in treating religion otherwise with some disrespect, a
mere abstract recognition of God as existing, and conven-

2 28 Evidence of Hume s Theism.

tional lifting of his hat to him (the pious part of the passage
seems really a little to suggest this), was the very least he
could do ia the way of a polite concession. To such a
thing as this in itself it would be stupid to assign import-
ance ; I include it as merely the first arrow in the sheaf —
and it is known, I believe, that with items of evidence, as
with arrows, each separate arrow (or item) may readily
enough be broken, whilst a sheaf of them cannot quite so
easUy be disposed of.

2. (Vol. i. p. 292 et seq.) — In re — the death of Hume's
mother. Some silly stuff having been circulated on this
subject picked up by an American traveller, and from him
quoted in the ' Quarterly Eeview,' Baron Hume, a relative,
thought it right to issue an authoritative protest ; and the
following is given by Mr Burton as the accurate truth of the
matter (the evidence seems unimpeachable, as indeed Mr
Burton is one of the last men likely to be found lax in
testing a question of evidence) : —

' David and be ' (the quotation is from the MS. Memoirs
of Dr Carlyle — the Jupiter Carlyle of Scott) — ' David and
he ' (the Honourable Mr Boyle, brother of the Earl of Glas-
gow) ' were both in London at the period when David's
' mother died. Mr Boyle, on hearing of it, soon after went
' into his apartment — for they lodged in the same house —
' where he found him in the deepest affliction and in a flood
' of tears. After the usual topics of condolence, Mr Boyle
' said to him — " My friend, you owe this uncommon grief to
' " having thrown off the principles of religion ; for if you had
' " not, you would have been consoled with the firm belief that
' " the good lady, who was not only the best of mothers, but
' " the most pious of Christians, was completely happy in the
' " realms of the just." To which David replied—" Though I

Evidence of Htime's Theism. 229

' " ihroio out my speculations to entertain the learned and
' " metaphysical world, yet, in other things, I do not think so
' " differently from the rest of the loorld as you imagine." '
In so far as this is to be believed — and there seems no
fair ground of doubt as to its substantial accuracy — it may
be held more or less to the purpose.

3. (Vol. ii. p. 220.) — Stm more to the purpose is the

anecdote — long since common property — thus given by Mr

Burton : ' Sir Samuel Eomilly has preserved the follow-

' ing curious statement by Diderot. He spoke of his ac-

' quaintance with Hume : " Je vous dirai un trait de lui, mais

' " il vous sera un pen scandaleux, peut-etre, car vous Anglais,

' " vous croyez un peu en Dieu; pour nous autres, nous n'y

' " croyons gudre. Hume dina avec une grande compagnie

' " chez le Baron d'Holbaoh. II etait assis Ji-c&t6 du Baron ; on

' " parla de la religion naturelle. 'Pour les Ath^es,' disait

'" Hume, 'je ne crois pas qu'il en existe, je n'en ai jamais

' " ' vu.' ' Vous avez iii. un peu malheureux,' repondit

' " I'autre ; ' vous voici a table avec dix-sept pour la pre-

' " ' miere fois.' " '

The authenticity of this has never, that I know of, been
called in question. But a good story is always suspicious ;
and Diderot — a wit and raconteur of the first order — was
undoubtedly quite capable of inventing this one. He
would scarce, however, as a master of the art, have done so,
unless with some mythical probability for it, so to speak, in
Hume's known and professed opinions. But —

4. (Vol. ii. p. 465.) — In point of fact, it matters little or
nothing what amount of truth we attribute to this story, in-
asmuch as the essence of it is elsewhere conveyed to us
under Hume's own hand, at the end of a highly curious
letter of gossip about Prince Charles Edward, the Pretender.

230 Evidence of Hume s Theism.

' Both Lord Marisolial and Helvetius agree, that with this
' strange character, he was no higot ; but rather had learned
'from the 2^1dlosopliers of Paris to affect a contempt for all
' religion. You must know that both these persons thought
' they were asQrihing to him an excellent quality ; indeed,
' both of them used to laugh at me for my nai-roio way of
' thinking in these particidars. However, my dear Sir John
' [Pringle], you will do me the justice to acquit me.' The
proof is thus clear beyond question, that Hume was by no
means an ' advanced thinker ' in the eyes of the thorough-
going gentlemen of the Encyclopedic ; but incurred (along
with Voltaire and Eousseau, who continue to figure along
with him in the popular mind as atheists) the ridicule and
intellectual scorn of Diderot and his lot, as ' oroyant un feu
en Dieu.' The truth I believe to be, that Hume believed
en Dieu not im pen, but entirely and as an article of faith,
and probably with as much enthusiasm as was possible for
a man whose enthusiasms were so purely and exclusively
intellectual.

5. (VoL ii. p. 451.) — The following, so far as believed —
and, as given by Mr Burton, there seems no ground for
calling it in question — seems even to show that at times he
could get up a little fervour on the subject.

' Yet the tone of his thoughts sometimes rose to enthu-
siasm. Thus the son of his valued friend Ferguson
' remembers his father saying' (the evidence is thus direct
from the younger Ferguson) ' that one clear and beautiful
' night, when they were walking home together, Hume
' suddenly stopped, looked up to the starry sky, and said,
' more after the manner of Hervey's " Meditations " than the
' "Treatise of Human Nature "—" Oh Adam! can any one
' " contemplate the wonders of that firmament, and not believe

Slight, yet perhaps S^lfficient. 231

' " tliat there is a God ? " ' — wHch, if true, seems pretty
conclusive.

About Hume, as about other men like him, many mere
lies have been fabricated by the pious imagination — in
honour, I suppose, of the Deity, not sufiloiently held
respected in some of his sceptical arguments. Contrariwise,
there may possibly have been some tendency in the friends
of Hume — by consent of all who ever knew him (if we ex-
cept the maniac Eousseau) one of the most admirable and
lovable of men — if not to invent anecdotes on the other
side, yet, perhaps, to colour them up a little. Making some
slight deduction for this, I must yet hold it proved, on the
evidence as adduced (though somewhat slighter than I had
supposed it), that Hume, despite of his sceptical reasonings
to the contrary, was a sincere, perhaps even a devout, behever
in the main truths of natural rehgion. I therefore think it
highly probable that when (vide my first item of evidence,
to which, in itself, as I said, no very great weight could be
given) he excluded from his sceptical criticism the sanctions
of morality, and ' the assent of the understanding to the
proposition tJiat God exists' (the italics are Hume's own),
he was perfectly sincere in so doing.

I also think it not unlikely that when, in his "Dialogues
on ^Natural Eeligion," he puts into the mouth of the sceptic
Philo (whom we are fairly entitled to consider as represent-
ing himself in the Dialogue — vide his letter to Gilbert Elliot,
see vol. i. p. 332) the following significant passage, he was
giving simple and plain expression to his own mode of
thought in the matter : —

'I must confess that I am less cautious on the subject of
' natural religion than on any other ; both because I know
' that I can never, on that head, corrupt the principles of

232 Perhaps Sufficient.

' any man of common-sense ; and because no one, I am confi-
' dent, in whose eyes I appear a man of common-sense, will
' ever mistake my intentions. You, in particular, Cleanthes,
' with whom I live in unreserved intimacy — you are sensible
' that notwithstanding the freedom of my conversation' (say
way of writing), ' and my love of singular arguments, no one
' has a deeper sense of religion impressed on his mind, or
' pays more profound adoration to the Divine Being, as He
' discovers Himself to reason in the inexplicable contrivance
' and artifice of Nature.'

Allowing for more or less suspicion here of the conven-
tional lifting of the hat to his Lordship, so to speak, in the
' profound adoration,' &o., I see really no reason to question
that in this we have genuine indication of Hume's own
mode of looking at the subject. If certain of the ' singular
arguments' of which he admits himself enamoured, may
seem at times to bear a little hard on the 'Divine Being as
He discovers Himself to reason,' &o., this does not in the
least discredit his belief in the Divine Being, of which we
have clear evidence elsewhere; it merelyillustrates that 'love
of singular arguments,' which he himself in a sense pleads
guilty to as proper to his speculative and sceptical intelli-
gence. JSTote, in all this, the exact consonance with what we
have seen reported as falling from him (see p.228-9) in a crisis
of the deepest seriousness : ' Though I throve out my specu-
' lations (or singular arguments) to entertain the learned and
' metaphysical world, yet I do not think so differently,' &c.
I have, as I hope, sufficiently shown, as against Mr Mill, who
surmises that Hume ' sincerely accepted both the premises
of his philosophy and the conclusions,' that the conclusions
he did not accept, as personally believing in the God who
finds but scant recognition in his philosophy. It remains

Hztme no Dogmatist i7i Negation. 233

to be considered in how far Hume ' sincerely accepted the
premises.' Provisionally he accepted them of course, as he
got them from Locke and Berkeley ; and the germ of scepti-
cism latent in the pious Bishop/ under Hume's fostering
hand was developed into a formidable upas-tree, beneath the
malign boughs of vfhich a good many ' precious convictions '
seemed in danger of withering out. Hume himself, how-
ever, did not very much believe in his own pretty speculations,
except as they amused himself in the exercise of his rest-
less intellect ; ' entertained (and perplexed) the learned and
metaphysical world ; ' and reduced his friends the theolo-
gians at times to a very sore pass indeed (his friends — inas-
much as Hume was on terms of kindly intimacy with almost
every clerical person of note in his time in Scotland). His
real point of view is very well indicated in one of his let-
ters to Miller his London publisher (vol. ii. p. 34) : ' As to
' my opinions, you Tcnow I defend none of them pusitivehj ;
' I only propose my doubts where I am so unhappy as not
' to receive the same conviction with the rest of mankind.
' It surprises me much to see anybody who pretends to be
' a man of letters discover anger on that account ; since it
' is certain by the experience of all ages that nothing eontri-
' hutes more to the progress of learning than such disputes
' and novelties.' The inference from this seems fair, that
Hume's position was as far as possible from that of the dog-
matist in positive negation (as supposed by Mr Mill), who ac-
cepted as final the conclusions of his sceptical argument ; but
a sceptic pure and simple who — never the dupe of his own

1 See Note N, Essays : ' This argument is drawn from Dr Berkeley ;
' and indeed most of the writings of that very ingenious author form
' the best lessons of scepticism which are to he found either among
' ancient or modern philosophers, Bayle not excepted.'

234 Hume's relatio7i to his Premises.

paradoxes — evolved his results in an unconcerned way, as
a sport of dialectic wMch amused Mm, and could not ser-
iously do harm to any one; whilst he clearly saw that
' such disputes and novelties ' might he useful in foiward-
' ing the progress of learning ' and of speculation on such
subjects.

This view will be found confirmed in the following pas-
sage ; for my present purpose — of determining so far as
possible Hume's exact relation to the premises from which he
reasoned — the most important which occurs in these volumes.
(See letter to Gilbert EUiot of Minto, vol. i. p. 334.)

' I am sorry our correspondence should lead us into these
' abstract speculations, &c. If in order to answer the doubts
' started, new iwinci'ples of philonophy must be laid, are not
' these doubts themselves very useful 1 Are they not pre-
' ferable to mere blind and ignorant assent ? / hope I can
' answer my own doubts ; but if I could not, is it to be won-
' dered at ? To give myself airs, and speak magnificently,
' might 1 7iot observe that Columbus did not conquer empires
' and plant colonies.'

A passage in several ways of special interest. The simple
clause, ' I hope I can answer my own doubts ' — by which,
it is to be supposed, Hume must have really meant some-
thing — makes it clear that Hume did not for himself ' accept
the conclusions ' to which his sceptical dialectic had guided
him ; while it is equally clear, from what precedes, that he
had exact prevision of the form which any answer to him must
assume, likely in the least to be formidable ; the polemic
against him must proceed, as he saw, not by the method of
attack on the logical consequence of his reasonings, but of
critical question as to the soundness and sufficiency of the
premises from which he reasoned. ' If in order to answer

Exact foresight of the Issues. 235

' the doubts started, new principles of philosophy must he laid,
' are not these doubts themselves very useful ? ' We fmd in
Hume here, the most exquisitely accurate appreciation of the
character of his intellectual work, and of the issues it had
made inevitable. Taking philosophy as he found it, and
accepting his premises as furnished to him by the then re-
ceived systems, he had exploded a torpedo under them, so
that philosophy could no farther be prosecuted, except by
remanding it to its first ground, and revising the very bases
of the business. On the lines of thought indicated by Locke,
the last word had been spoken ; thought on such subjects
had been ruthlessly run up into a hopeless cul-de-sac, out of
which there was no extrication for it, save only by the method
of retreat, and seeking for a fresh start in the announcement
of ' new principles of philosophy.' Confident in the strin-
gency of his logic, Hume saw that its results were only to
be impeached, by impeachment of the sufiiciency of his
premises; that if his doubts were at aU. effectively to be
answered (as he himself very well knew they might — ' I
hope I can answer my own doubts '), it could only be on
one condition — ^'new principles of philosophy must be
laid.' In his own somewhat grandiloquent figure, like
Columbus, leaving the old world (philosophy as he found
and accepted it), he had led men to the borders of a new
one; the discovery or indication of this was for him a sufficient
feat ; it was for others to conquer and colonise it. We have
thus, in Hume here, the exactest prescience — one might
almost say prophecy — of the polemic against him begun
here by Eeid about ten years after (date of letter, 1751), as
by Kant somewhat later in Germany.

Mr Mill writes (see Note before referred to) : ' This is
' certainly the use which has been made of Hume's argu-

236 Mr Mill's notion he had none.

' ment by Eeid and many other of his opponents. Admit-
' ting their validity as arguments, Eeid considered them not
' as proving Hume's conclusions, hut as a redudio ad absur-
' dum of his premises. That Hume, however, had any fore-
' sight of their being put to this use, either for a dogmatical
' or a purely sceptical purpose, appears to me supremely
' improhahle.' It appears to me, contrariwise, on evidence
of the passage cited — the significance of which, slight and
casual as it is, cannot, I think, he mistaken — that Hume's
' foresight ' of Eeid's procedure, as the only one intellec-
tually competent, was as exact and precise as it could pos-
sibly be.

When, ten years later, Eeid was preparing for the press
his 'Inquiry into the Human Mind,' he wished, through
his friend Blair, to have Hume's opinion of the work.
Hume, though in the first instance (as having been under
the coarse thong of Warburton) expressing a slightly petu-
lant ' wish that the parsons would confine themselves to
' their old occupation of worrying one another, and leave
' philosophers to argue with temper, moderation, and good
' manners ' (it may be feared that philosophers, no more
than parsons, have on all occasions made exhibition of these
virtues), not the less went over the proof-sheets ; and recog-
nising in tJiis parson his peer, wrote him in terms of noble
courtesy and compliment. I extract from his letter the
special passage which seems here to have some pertinence
(see vol. ii. p. 154) : 'I shall therefore forbear' (after hint-
ing some possible objections) ' till the whole can be before
' me, and shall not at present propose any farther difficulties
' to your reasonings. I shall only say that, if you have been
' able to clear up these abstruse and important subjects, in-
' stead of being mortified, 1 shall be so vain as to pretend to a

Hume and Reid. 237

' sliare of the praise ; and shall tMiik that my errors, by hav-
' ing at least some coherence, had led you to make a more
' strict review of my principles, lohich were the common
' ones, and to perceive their futUity.' This futility of ' my
principles which were the common ones ' heing perceived
and made out, ' new principles of philosophy must be laid,'
as Hume, ten years before, had himself presciently written.
The course of thought is exactly as he had foreseen it must
be ; and when his prophecy — so call it — receives thus in
Eeid fulfilment, he professes that in Eeid's success (such as
it may chance to be) he can feel no mortification, as of right
in his own person 'pretending to a share in the praise.'
'If in order to answer my doubts,' &c., were not they a
seed worth sowiug, however otherwise at the instant bigots
and blockheads might think of it ? This ' Columbus of the
moral seas ' rather welcomes, than resents as an intrusion,
the advent of the first colonist to his new continent dis-
covered ; and presently had he but lived a little, he would
have had to welcome (nor need it be doubted that with
an honourable pride he would have done so) the advent of
another and greater one.

Such portion as also seems to have pertinence, of Eeid's
gratified letter in reply, it may not be amiss to quote in
conclusion (vol. ii. p. 155): —

' In attempting to throw new light upon these abstruse
' subjects, I wish to preserve the due mean betwixt confi-
' dence and despair. But, whether I have any success in this
' attempt or not, I shall always avow myself your disciple in
' metaphysics. I have learned more from your writings in
' this kind, than from all others put together. Your system
' appears to me not only coherent in all its parts, but likewise
\justly deduced from principles commonly received among

238 Exchange of Coii,rtesies.

' philnsopliers — prinoipleswhioli I never thought of calling in
' question, until the conclusions you draw from them in the
' " Treatise of Human Nature '' made me suspect them. If
' tJtese principles are solid, your system must stand; and
' whether they are or not, can tetter he judged after you have
' brought to light the whole system that grows out of them,
' than when the greater part of it was wrapped up in clouds
' and darkness. I agree with you, therefore, that if this
' system shall ever he demolished, you have a just claim to a
' great share of the praise, both because you have made it a
' distinct and determinate mark to be aimed at, and have
' furnished proper artillery for the purpose.'

These extracts from Mr Burton's Life of Hume being
given (and I confess they are not so conclusive as from
memory I had thought them likely to be), I have simply to
leave it to the reader to decide on the evidence before him,
whether Mr Mill or Sir W. Hamilton has the more accurately
appreciated Hume's philosophical attitude and significance ;
which of the two it is who has most ' misunderstood the
essential character of Hume's mind.']

In preparing the above, I was unaware that in the
Appendix to Professor Veitch's 'Life of Hamilton' this
subject is expressly, and at some length, treated of j the aim
of Professor Veitch being precisely as mine, to defend Ham-
ilton, in as far as might be, against the charge of ignorant
misapprehension thrown out by Mr John Stuart Mill.
As I read with much interest the ' Life of Hamilton ' when
it appeared, I consider it nearly certain I must also have
read the Appendix to it ; and if so, I am a little at a loss to
know how I could have forgotten this discussion contained

Prof. VeitcJi s ^ Life of Hamilton.' 2 Tig

in it. So it was, however ; and it was only the other day,
that on my casually taking up the hook, which came across
me by the merest accident, my attention was drawn to these
pages, which, if read, had unaccountably slipped from my
mind. My treatment of the subject is not, however, so
identical with that of the Professor that it is necessary to
suppress my statement. "With this reference, which is obvi-
ous and proper, it may be given for what it may be worth,
as merely in supplement of his. Of the quotations made
by me from Hume, only one is used by Professor Veitch —
the extract given at p. 236 from his letter to Eeid, ' I shall
only say,' &c. He follows it up, however, by a citation
from a letter to Hutcheson, which somehow had escaped my
scrutiny, but may now be as well here included (vol. i. p.
118) : ' I assure you that, without running any of the heights
' of scepticism, I am apt in a cool hour to suspect, in general,
' that most of my reasonings will be more tiseful by furnishing
' hints and exciting people's curiosity, than as containing any
'principles that will augment the stock of knowledge that must
' pass to future ages.'

240 Passage from Mr Mill.

iSToTB IV.

{Mill and Garlyle, p. 90 et seq.)

" We should scarce liave thought it possible that any man
worth one's while to reply to would propound as the difference
between man and stone which legitimates moral judgment of
the one and not of the other, the inherence of a will in the
man ; if ex hypothesi, that wiU must itself be held to act

' Not willingly, but tangled in the fold
Of dire Necessity, whose law '

determines its minutest decision. But we find to our grief
and consternation, in Mr John Stuart Mill, such a man.
From a passage already incidentally glanced at, there seems
little doubt that, in the last resort, it is thus Mr Mill would
seek to escape from the difficulty. At p. 514 we find him
thus writing : — ' Yes ; if he really " could not help " acting
' as he did ; that is, if his will could not have helped it ; if
' he was under physical constraint, or under the action of
' such a violent motive, that no fear of punishment could have
• any effect ; which, if capable of being ascertained, is a just
' round of exemption, and is the reason why, by the laws
' of most countries, people are not punished for what they
' were compelled to do by immediate danger of death.' A
passage this which seems for Mr Mill an unhappy one. For
how, on his principles, is it possible to maintain a valid
distinction between the exceptional cases given as incapaci-

Criticism of it. 241

tating the will, and thus claiming of right ' exemption ' from
moral judgments, and other oases for which no such plea of
exemption is urged ? In a case of physical constraint, the
will of the man is in abeyance to the pressure of a physical
causation ; in a case of such overmastering motive as no fear
of punishment can countervail, the will of the man is in
abeyance to that of a moral causation ; and in either case,
Mr Mill holds that, inasmuch as ' his will could not have
helped it,' exemption from blame must be accorded. What
then of a case in which the motive, though somewhat less
absolutely tyrannous, was yet of violence sufficient to deter-
mine the man to crime ? Is there here no rigour of moral
causation ? And if in this case, not less than in the other,
the causal necessity is admitted, on what ground is the right
of the man denied to the ' exemption ' granted his fellow ?
' Gould his will in tMs case have helped it \ ' — in any case,
in which the motive was the sufficient reason of the act t
Mr Mill must here be supposed to imply as much, though
he could only explicitly maintain it by a plunge into fatal
inconsequence. For in no ease could ' the tuill of the man
have helped ' his act, except by being determined differ-
ently ; and if it could not determine itself differently, how
its different determination could be come at except through
that ' difference in the antecedents ' which Mr Mill himself
has taught us to exclude, he will find it hard to explain.
How, farther, are we to distinguish between a case in which
' no fear of punishment could have any effect,' and one in
which the fear of punishment had no effect? If it had
no effect, how could it have had any 1 Solely by being a
stronger fear, in relation to the antagonist impulse; to suppose
it which, is once more to suppose a change in the antecedents,
with a revolution, as involved in this, of the whole previous

242 Criticism continued.

order of the world. Mr Mill seems here in Ms argument
somewhat in the hapless case of the philosophical gentle-
man in the Tempest, ' the latter end of whose commonwealth
forgets the beginning.' Briefly, if Mr MOl, to the exclu-
sion of Freedom, includes human actions under the law of
Universal Causation, we are at least entitled to insist on his
steadily conceiving it Universal. If Physical Causation in-
capacitates the Will, must not Moral Causation incapacitate?
and if not, what is the rational ground of the distinction ?
Farther, if in special cases, as Mr Mill admits, Moral Caus-
ation incapacitates, must it not incapacitate in all ? and if
not, how not ? Freedom apart, could in any case the ' loill
of a man have helped ' his doing as he did, any more than
his falling to the earth, if he found himself flung forth of
window ? Mr MiU cannot say so except in manifest outrage
of his own principles. The formula of ' his mill could not
have helped it,' which he exclusively announces as ground
of ' exemption ' from moral judgments, in cases of physical
constraint and tyrannous extremity of motive, must needs,
on these principles, he extended to all outlying human actions,
with the like inference of ' exemption.' Mr Mill's 'yes —
' if he really " could not help " acting as he did ; that is, if
' his will could not have helped it ; if he was under physical
' constraint,' on the extension of its second clause, which
his own previous reasoning to a change of antecedents neces-
sitates, amounts in point of fact then to this — that in any
given case, the man ' really could not help ' acting as he
did, any more than if he had been under physical constraint ;
how then, any more than in that case, he is to he held a fit
subject of Uame, we may ask Mr Mill to demonstrate, and
give him his own time to it.i When he has succeeded in
1 Let me say quite frankly that I think it needed a little coolness

Continued. 243

doing so, we shall admit his title to be found writing as
follows : —

" ' If the desire of right and aversion to wrong have yielded
' to a small temptation, we judge them to be weak, and our
' disapprobation is strong. If the temptation to which they
' have yielded is so great that even strong feelings of virtue
' might have succumbed to it, our moral reprobation is less
' intense. If, again, the moral desires and aversions have
' prevailed, but not over a very strong force, we hold that
' the action was good, but that there was little merit in it ;
' and our estimate of the merit rises in exact proportion to
' the greatness of the obstacle which the moral feeling proved
' strong to overcome.'

" Meantime, it is sufficiently clear that the phrases merit
or demerit, moral approbation or reprobation, can, except as,
so to speak, stolen, have no place in ' Mr MiU's vocabulary.
For how should a desire or aversion as failing in the hour of
temptation, incur his moral censure as loeak, if, being, as it
is, the last link in a chain, of unconditional sequences, we
can only suppose it stronger, by supposing a change in the
series of these sequences 1 To alter the whole world from
the beginning is surely the sort of feat, for his culpable ne-
glect to perform which it seems odd to arraign a poor sinner.
Further, in the matter of temptations yielded to, or resisted,
why should he apportion his moral approval or the reverse,
according to the strength or weakness of the temptation 1
Is not the weakest temptation which results in act, as strict-
ly as the very strongest, the sufficient reason of the act, and
in so far forth the excuse of it 1 Two temptations, a strong
and a weak respectively, having induced act, does Mr Mill

on Mr Mill's part quietly to reprint his passage, with this criticism
of it staring him in the face.

244 Concluded.

really suppose in the strong temptation any compulsory
power to induce its act, whicli did not also reside in the weak
one ? And why talk of strength or weakness of temptation?
These phrases have only meaning in relation to the strength
of antagonist impulses, a strength severely predetermined like
that of the temptation itself. The question of the result
can plainly no more he a moral one, than if it simply con-
cerned the tilting of weights on a balance. It is impossible
a writer should enmesh himself in a net of more fatal incon-
sistencies.''

Gejiesis of the Free-will Doctrine. 245

Note V.— See p. 128.

Genesis of the Feee-Will Doctrine.

Of Mr Sully's essay so entitled, it is not my purpose to
attempt any critical estimate. I -wish merely to recognise
it, en passant, as a fresh and original contribution to tlie
literature of this vexed subject, soliciting, as such, the at-
tention of those for whom it has an interest. The discussion
embodies a great deal of subtle and ingenious thinking ; but
as to its substantive value, I desire to express no opinion.

Mr Sully seems so far right in supposing, to conclude,
that ' if his attempt at psychological analysis has succeeded,
' the logical side of the question is necessarily affected,' in-
asmuch as ' any mode of explanation which shows how a
' given idea may have arisen from the inherent laws of the
' mind itself, offers a new hypothesis which thenceforth
' competes with the supposition of a real objective origin.'
Mr Sully's genesis of the idea accepted — that is — Freedom
as a so-called 'direct deliverance of consciousness' may be
held to be somewhat discredited, as possibly a mere illusion
— an illusion of which an account has been given, as such.

Some genesis of the idea of Freedom I had myself hypo-
thetically furnished, merely in development of a hint from
one of Hume's Notes (see p. 24). As hinted by Hume and

246 Consciousness of Freedom Universal.

developed by myself, it seemed to me so plausible, and even
cogent, that I did not see my way to dispose of it (see p.
127) except by announcing, as against it, so very big a
matter as a supposed ' fundamental necessity of reason ' ;
and it was my notion ^tliat if the idea in question could
reaUy be shown to have its ground in this, a good deal
would be made out for it. A belief which, according to
Mr Sully, is shown to ' arise from the inherent laws of the
mind itself,' and, as doing so, is found universal in its opera-
tion, seems much in the same case ; it is scarce to be dis-
missed (in Mr Sully's phrase elsewhere) as a mere ' vagary
of subjective consciousness,' seeing it seems to have all
the authority which can be claimed for a natural belief : it
is, in fact, as in terms defined, something very like a genuine
datum of consciousness ; and as such — if so admitted —
would have been held by Mr Mill himself unimpeach-
able. As to how far, again, a natural belief, even if so ad-
mitted, may be guarantee to us of what Mr Sully calls ' a
real objective origin,' this is precisely the most perplexed
problem in metaphysics ; and as, meantime, I don't in the
least see my way in it, and have nearly no hope of ever
being able to do so, I am naturally indisposed to discuss it
with Mr Sully or any one else.

I have above spoken of the lelief in Free-will (meaning
practical feeling or consciousness) as universal, though of
course quite aware, in so doing, that its universality may be
very stiffly denied. The denial (supposed) does not, how-
ever, prove much. It seems to prove merely what before we
very well knew, that a philosopher sufliciently cursed with a
' theory ' will deny almost anything whatever which he
finds to be in serious conflict with it ; will deny his own
nose, if need be, and might even, in the enthusiasm of

Mr Mill at least had it. 247

science — as emulous of the sainted Origen — go the length of
cutting it off in order to make good his case. Mr Sully is,
I should suppose, one of these scientific enthusiasts. ' No
' doubt,' he says, ' there are other facts, besides those
' named, which may help to account for the belief w certain
' minds. For to those who have given hut little thought to
' the subject, any slight misapprehension of volitional phe-
' nomena will be sufficient to confirm and sustain a belief
' taught them by the traditional unexamined philosophy
' which circulates through a large part of society.' One of
these ' certain minds ' in which ' the belief was sustained,'
was the mind of Mr John Stuart MUl. This I have irre-
fragably shown ; I have proved what is too palpable to be
denied, when decisively pointed out (though possibly some
rash admirers of Mr MiU may be found bold enough to deny
it), that Mr MiU could scarce on this subject write two con-
secutive pages without sliding into modes of statement
which are absolutely without meaning at all, except as
' ipso facto committing him ' (Mr Sully's phrase) to a
belief in the article of Freedom. That Mr Mill ' could have
helped' his every voluntary action is — as we have seen —
expressly and repeatedly vouched to us under his own hand
as his genuine feeling and belief.

It wlU scarce be alleged that he ' had given but little
thought to the subject,' seeing he has himself told us (see
Autobiography) that for long his most painful and per-
plexed cogitation had been given to it, as to a matter of
spiritual life or death, as in a sense it may almost be said to
be. Few minds of our time can have been more thoroughly
emancipated than his from 'the traditional unexamined
philosophy which circulates through a large part of society;'
and as to ' misapprehensions of volitional phenomena,' to

248 Probably other People also.

whioli he had given much of his attention, he was perhaps
as little likely to he guilty of them as even Mr Sully him-
self. The depth and pertinacity of the conviction can scarce
he more clearly demonstrated than as thus, in its continuing
to dominate such a mind as that of Mr Mill, despite his
express and even contemptuous polemic against it. It may,
however, as Mr Sully phrases it, ' rest on mere vagaries of
subjective consciousness ; ' hut whether or no so resting, it is
certain Mr Mill's consciousness testified to it in the plainest
VTay. He denied this, of course, or sought to deny it (in
express terms he never did or would, as shown — see p. 30
et sp.q.); but this only proves, as before said, that a philo-
sopher will deny anything if his theory requires of him
denial.

I venture to think it probable that the practical feehng or
consciousness of both Professor Bain and Mr SuUy^ — if in
either case we could get at it quite accurately — would also
be found to testify to Freedom, defined as a power in us to
help our actions. People who follow Mr Mill in believing
that moral sequences (seep. 185, 186) are 'susceptible of
counteraction or modification'- — that though a material se-
quence is ' resistless,' the sequences which determine ' human
action ' are resistible — need not hesitate to follow him far-
ther, and also accept along with him what is really an iden-
tical proposition.

A man's practical feeling (or consciousness) in regard
of this or any other matter is one thing ; his speculative
theory, belief, conviction — or what you wiU — is something
quite different : and it is really a pity that a distinction so
obvious as this (which a child might be supposed able to
appreciate) should be so persistently ignored as it seems to

Confusion on the Subject. 249

be, by really profound philosophers. My ' practical feel-
ing' as regards anything I do is, that I could 'have
helped ' doing it, and done othenoise ; not in the entirely
stupid sense that I could have done otherwise, had I so
willed (which is obvious), but that I could have otherwise
so willed, and done. If any man tells me that his ' practical
feeling' in the matter is otherwise — that he, for his part,
practically feels that in nothing ' can he help ' doing as he
does, be it for good or evil — I have simply to say — I doiHt Re-
lieve him. I believe him to be involved in the helpless con-
fusion above indicated ; he is incapable of distinguishing be-
tween what is really his practical feeling in the matter, and
the speculative belief to which he is intellectually pledged.
As habitually regarding his consciousness through some
mist of his reasoned preconceptions, he is incapable of an
accurate observation and candid notation of its contents.

But after all, as Mr Sully of course knows, the announce-
ment of Freedom as given us directly in Consciousness is not
by most of its advocates considered the specially strong point
of the position; and by Hamilton, in particular, so very little
stress is laid on it, that Mr Mill is even disposed to ques-
tion whether he distinctly commits himself to any such an-
nouncement — 'he speaks' as to the point, says Mr Mill,
' with some appearance of doubt.' Since Kant, and — as
following him in England — Coleridge, most writers in behalf
of Freedom seem mainly disposed to rely on the argument
in which it is indirectly assumed as an implication of the
Moral Consciousness, which, failing of Freedom as its
ground, must be sceptically disposed of as illusory. And
to this line of argument I have not as yet seen any answer
attempted which did not seem to me — sans phrase about it

250 The Moral Argument.

- — simply so much mere sophistry and subterfuge. In the
very few hints which Mr Sully throws out on this part of
the subject (and, in accordance with the scheme of his
paper, he could only incidentally glance at it), I do not find
anything novel, or such as leads me to suppose that a fuller
development of his views would result in an exception in
his favour.

Catise.

251

Note VI.

Mr Mill's Psychological Theory of Matter. 1

{Pendant to Note, p. 147).

I AM at a loss to conjecture how Mr Mill would reply to
tMs, or any one else in his interest. It is chiefly in its
function as caiise — the admitted (or assumed) cause of our
sensations — that matter — a non-Ego, so called — has any
speculative interest for us. Any ' theory of matter,'
therefore, which comes decisively to grief in regard of this
causal relation, may, without further ' curious inquiry,' be
civilly set aside as a figment of the idle brain, and merely a
worthless irrelevance. Mr MUl's ' Psychological Theory of
a Belief in the External World ' is, as I hope to be able to
show in a few very rapid sentences, precisely in this sad
predicament. The cardinal consideration of cause could
not, of course, be absent from Mr Mill's mind ; and is
treated of in his Discussion expressly, and even elaborately.
What, then, is the cause of sensation assigned in Mr Mill's
'Psychological Theory'? Surprising as it surely must be
thought, Mr Mill's cause of sensation is nothing else than
sensation itself, in what he calls its ' permanent possibili-
ties.' Out of simple or primary sensation, Mr Mill can

■■■ This paper was in substance written whilst Mr John Stuart Mill
still lived ; I have not cared to recast it, but give it originally as
composed, ad Jtominem.

252 Mr Mill's Cause of Sensaiion.

cleverly evolve these by a ' psychological method ' all his
own ; and when evolved, he makes them do duty as
cause of the very sensations out of which he has evolved
or conglomerated them. A priori, I should have held it
unlikely that a man like Mr Mill should commit himself to
such a speculation as this ; but the proof that he has done
so is clear. Sensations, as originally given, are under cer-
tain laws of association and so forth (I must be excused
from exhibiting the process, which I only imperfectly un-
derstand — readers are referred to Mr Mill for it), worked up
into certain conglomerates ; and these conglomerates (pos-
sibilities of sensation, so called) we are seriously asked to
accept as cause of the sensations themselves I The ab-
surdity is as patent and monstrous as if, on my inquiry as
to the cause of a little heap of oats, let us say (one illustra-
tion will do as well as another), it should presto be ground
into meal, and a cake should be baked of it and put before
me. No grosser confusion in the inversion of cause and
effect — for I suppose that the oats, plus of course the
miller and the cook, are to be held the authentic cause of
the cake (as the primary sensations, plus the associative
laws, must be held the cause in the other case) — will readily,
unless I mistake, be found in any philosopher.

The utmost that can be said for Mr Mill here, by himself
or by any one else, is, that he has merely exhibited certain
mental processes (and meant to do no more, as indeed is
really the case), whereby, from the basis of primitive sensa-
tion, by inseparable association, &c., it is possible or con-
ceivable that his ' permanent possibilities of sensation '
might first be formed as conglomerates, and afterwards, as
illusively objectified, come to figure as a veritable non-Ego,
or true cause of sensation. And undoubtedly this is quite

Mr Mill's Cmise. 253

conceivable j as indeed is any other nonsense, by people who
do not clearly see it to be nonsense. But surely nothing
can be much more obvious than that the cause of primitive
sensation can by no possibility he a conglomerate or so-
caUed ' possibility ' of sensation, which is only gradually
compacted aftenoards !

"Would Mr Mill be pleased ±0 observe that of the very
first sensation developed in the Ego, a cause must be asked
for and given. That cause must either be the Ego itself,
or some form of a non-Ego. Mr Mill may have his choice
of the two ; and perhaps he will not refuse to admit that
this cause — whatever it may be — as sufficient for the first
sensation, must needs be sufiicient for the second, for the
third, and so of the whole subsequent series. Mr MUl's
psychologically concocted cause — or [quasi) non-Ego of
permanent possibilities — is thus impeached as superfluous,
a vera causa already existing, competent to all the pheno-
mena. And besides being superfluous, it is also, as we have
seen, ridiculous in the inversion of cause and effect, a certain
conglomerate of sensation being gravely produced to account
for its own constituent antecedents. On which surely suf-
ficient grounds, Mr Mill's psychologically concocted substi-
tute for the non-Ego of reason and consciousness may per-
emptorily, and without more ado about it, be swept into the
dreary limbo of things abortive and inane. We need not
the less sincerely admire and respect the ingenuity shown
in its concoction. But nobody ever yet called in question
Mr Mill's philosophical ingenuity. And, in fact, it is no-
where displayed to more advantage than in this grotesquely
unhappy speculation. In brief, the caxwe of primitive sen-
sation cannot possibly be sensation itself in any of its subse-
quent developments ; and a " theory," such as that of Mr

2 54 Cannot be the Vera Causa.

Mill, whioli has no other cause of it to offer, seems in very
evil case as a theory.

' The sensations,' writes Mr Mill, ' though the original
'•foundation of the loliole, come to be looked upon as a sort of
' accident depending on us, and the possibilities as much
' more real than the actual sensations, nay, as the very reali-
' ties of which these are' only the representations or effects.^
Again, ' The whole set of sensations as possible form a per-
' manent background to any one or more of them that are, at
' any given moment, actual; and the possibilities are conceived
' as standing to the actual sensations in the relation of a cause
' to its effects.' Primitive sensation, that is, admitted by Mr
Mill as ' the original foundation of the whole,' comes to be
' conceived of ' by us as an effect (so Mr Mill tells us), the
eause of which is a subsequent development of sensation ! !

' Psychology,' says Hamilton (Lectures, vol. ii. p. 425),
' proposes to exhibit the mental phenomena in their natural
' consecution, that is, as they condition and suppose each
' other. A system which did not accomplish this could make
' no pretension to be a veritable exposition of our internal
'life.' In its outrage of all 'natural consecution' I decline
to accept Mr Mill's speculation as ' a veritable exposition,'
&o. As the cause of sensation assigned in Mr Mill's expo-
sition can by no possibility be the vera causa, which must
plainly be sought elsewhere, it has no relation, save of falsity,
to the actual fact of the matter ; and I submit that a specu-
lation, thus shown to be metaphysically worthless, cannot
be psychologically valuable. That in the sane and normal
exercise of our faculties we are ' psychologically ' deter-
mined to error, as under a natural necessity to ' conceive of
this or any other matter, under forms of the merest absur-
dity, seems itself an absurd proposition. In the light of all

Passage from Destutt Tracy. 255

this I consider I was fully justified in saying, as I did (p.
147), that Mr MiU, in assuming sensation, and proceeding
to manipulate it as a fact of which no explanation is needed,
did reaUy fling hlindly at his heels the very problem he was
bound to elucidate for us.

Mr Mill's definition of Matter, so called, as a ' permanent
possibility of sensation,' has been praised by a friendly
critic as being, from the point of view of the idealist, ' the
happiest and most exact that has yet been given.' It is
scarcely, however, Mr Mill's, who has ' conveyed ' it from
M. Destutt Tracy. Of Destutt Tracy I know positively
nothing, except from a passage (which Mr Mill may be as-
sumed to have read) quoted by Professor Bain at the end of
his volume entitled ' The Emotions and the Will.' It may
be worth while to quote it in extenso ; inasmuch as, besides
the coincidence — so call it — with Mr Mill, it is in itself
suggestive of some little criticism. ' The following extracts
' from Destutt Tracy,' writes Professor Bain, ' are a true
' statement of our position in reference to the perception of
' the external world.' (By the our he may be supposed to
imply generally the school of thought to which he belongs.)

' II s'ensuit de la ' (for brevity's sake, as beside the pre-
sent purpose, I suppress two previous paragraphs — the
italics are Professor Bain's) ' que nos perceptions sont tout
pour nous ; que nous ne connaissons jamais rien que nos
perceptions ; qu'elles sont les seules choses vraiment r^elle
pour nous, et que la r^alit^ que nous reconnaissons dans
les etres qui nous les causent, n'est que second aire, et ne
consiste que dans le pouvoir permanent de faire toujours les
memes impressions dans les memes cir Constances, soit k nous,
soit h d'autres etres sensibles qui nous en rendent compte.' —
Ideologie.

256 Criticism of it.

It would have been well for Mr Mill if, taking so much
of Tracy's definition, he had taken it tout entier, as it is just
possible a due consideration of these indispensable ' etres
qui nous Les causent ' might have suggested to him some
more rational explanation of the matter than he has reached
in his own ' Theory.'

To pass to consideration of the passage itself, which, as it
seems to me, is involved in gross contradiction. We are
told ' que nos perceptions sont tout pour nous.' Yet pre-
sently after, we hear tell of ' la rdalitd que nous reconnais-
sons dans les etres qui nous les causent.' Surely, if these
are 'etres qui nous les causent,' they are as accurately to be
held jpo^i" nous, as the resulting perceptions themselves
are. The perceptions are thus, then, not '■tout pour
nous,' as they were said to be ; we must supplement
them, as also ' pour nous,' by ' les etres qui nous les
causent ; ' and these etres must be ' vraiment r^elles,' or
real entities, otherwise they could have no ' pouvoir de faire,'
i.e., could not possibly function as causes. To say that the
reality we recognise in them ' n'est que secondaire,' is really
nothing to the purpose. Of course, in a sense, their reality
is secondary — secondary in the order of thought or cogni-
tion, primary in the order of existence, inasmuch as a
cause must needs be conceived of (except now and then
by Mr John Stuart Mill) as antecedent of its own effect.
But the reality is equally in either case ' vraiment r^eUe '
and 'pour nous.' Our perceptions are not, then, as alleged,
' les seules choses vraiment reelles pour nous.' We have
thus given us, in the passage quoted, the Ego, as determined
in sense-perception — an Etre, or real entity, as cause, deter-
mining it to its sense -perceptions. And, unless as reso-
lute to evade a difficulty, Professor Bain and his friends

Professor Bain a Dualist. 257

choose to take up witli a seZ/-deterininiiig Ego, this raal
entity as cause must needs be external to the percipient
mind ; in other words, as solid and efficient a non-Ego as
any natural dualist needs desire, were it even Sir William
Hamilton himself. The sole question which could arise
would he as to the particular mochcs in which this indisput-
able non-Ego is come at — whether by immediate or direct
intuition a la Hamilton, or by a necessary inference of
reason from an effect back to its cause. And as this pre-
sumed inference of reason — supposing it to exist — is so
natural, spontaneous, and inevitable, that a very small child
is competent to it, in whom reason yet sleeps in the germ
(for, as Mr Mill admits, 'the Ego and non-Ego are clearly
' developed notions, except in the very beginnings of con-
' sciousness'), the distinction between the two statements —
though, indeed, it might be possible to split hairs about it —
seems so trivial that it may very well be held non-existent.
TJiis, then, is what Professor Bain puts before us as ' a true
statement of our position in reference to the perception of
the external world.' Professor Bain (and along with him
all the gentlemen who choose to be included in the our) is a
2)seudo-ideaiist, who really ought with due convenient speed
to migrate to the camp of Eeid and Hamilton. Mr Mill, on
the other hand, is, no doubt, a very thorough-going idealist,
but at what a price paid for it in absurdity, we have seen.
He is not, however, a Berkeleyan, as some people call him,
and perhaps he would choose to be considered. Berkeley's
— whatever otherwise may be thought of it — is, at least, so
far as it goes, a consistent and logical scheme of thought ;
and whilst questioning our sense-perceptions as guarantee of
anything external to the mind, such as we popularly call
matter, he subsumes the Deity as cause of them. Berke-
R

258 Permanent Possibilities.

ley's Deity as cause has no place in Mr Mill's speculation j
and the only cause of sensation assigned in it is the
wretched ineptitude of which, in the above, I have sought
to make some little exposition and exposure.

Farther, it seems to me that Mr Mill, in announcing his
' permanent possibilities of sensation ' as a substitute for
the non-Ego, as hitherto understood, is merely throughout
deluding himself with a form of words without meaning.
I have said (p. 147) : ' It seems to admit of question indeed,
' whether the element oi permanence — on which plainly lies
' the stress of the proof — is fairly deduced from the premises.
' To myself it looks a little as if Mr Mill, more suo, rather
' smuggles it in as he proceeds, making quiet " conveyance "
' of it from the material world, some eidolon of which he
' is engaged in trying to construct, than exhibits it as in
' rational process evolved.'

Now this, it will be found, on closer examination, is pre-
cisely what Mr Mill has done. ' What is it we mean,'
asks Mr Mill, ' when we say that the object we perceive is
' external to us, and not a part of our own thoughts 1 "We
' mean that there is in our perceptions something which
' exists when we are not thinking of it ; which existed
' before we had even thought of it, and would exist if
' we were annihilated. This idea of something which is
' distinguished from our fleeting impressions by what, in
' Kantian language, is called PerdurabUity — something
' which is fixed and the same while our impressions
' vary, &c. — constitutes altogether our idea of external sub-
' stance. Whoever can assign an origin to this complex con-
' ception has accounted for what we mean by the belief in
' matter.' And Mr Mill, ' according to the Psychological

Deduction of Permanence. 259

' Theory,' proceeds to ' assign an origin to this complex con-
' ception.' Its origin is assigned, thus —

'I see a piece of white paper on a table. I go into
' another room, and though I have ceased to see it, I am
' persuaded that the paper is still there. I no longer have
' the sensations which it gave me ; but I believe that when
' I again place myself in the circumstances in which I had
' these sensations, that is, when I go again into the room '
(2.6., place myself again in presence of the paper), 'I shall
' again have them ; and farther, that there has been no inter-
' vening moment at which this would not have been the
' case. Owing to this law of my mind, my conception of
' the world at any given instant consists, in only a small
' proportion, of present sensations. The conception I form
' of the world existing at any moment, comprises, along with
' the sensations I am feeling, a countless variety of possibili-
' ties of sensation, namely, &c. These various possibilities
' are the important thing to me in the world. My present
' sensations are generally of little importance, and are, more-
' over, fugitive ; the possibilities, on the contrary, are per-
' manent, which is the character that mainly distinguishes
' our idea of substance or matter from our notion of
' sensation.'

Mr Mill undertakes to ' assign an origin to this complex
conception ' — of Perdurability or permanence ; he forthwith
sets before us a concrete instance of it, in terms in nothing
to be distinguished from those which would be used by the
stanchest realist; and presently he proceeds as above —
'The possibilities, on the contrary, are permanent^ But
apart from the instance in the concrete — the substantial
piece of white paper — from which he makes illicit ' convey-

2 6o Groimd of Permanence.

anoe' of it, his element oi permanence is nowhere ; he stood
hound to exhihit it in the abstract, as a rational deduction
from his premises, and he makes not the smallest attempt to
do so. And perhaps it was as well that he should not ; for
if — and such is the gist of his speculations — there be no
permanent Ego, and no permanent non-Ego, it is not quite
easy to see how any ground of permanence can be come at.^
M"ot the less some ground of the permanence which he
ascribes to his ' possibilities of sensation,' Mr Mill is bound
to assign, if his speculation is to be held worth anything ;
and the only rational ground of permanence for possibili-
ties of sensation, or of anything else, is the existence of per-
manent causes. ' Possibilities of sensation ' imply, as their
ground, causes of sensation ; abolish all causes of sensation,
and you plainly abolish all 'possibilities' of it; unless, in-
deed, it be iMssiUe — as Mr Mill, in terms of his ' theory,' is
clearly bound to maintain — that effects should occur without
causes, save merely absurd and illusory ones. These ' pos-
sibilities of sensation,' writes Mr Mill, ' are conditional
certainties ; ' and if anything seems plain, it might, I think,
be held to be this, that the indispensable condition of cer-
tainty for any sensation as an effect, is the presence and
efficiency of a cause of the special sensation. Possibilities of
sensation (to quote Mr Mill himself in another relation — see

1 It should seem, from a passage in Mr Mill's Appendix to these
chapters in his Fourth Edition, that precisely some such ohjection as
the above had been pressed on him by other critics ; and (see p. 251)
he does what he can to elude it — with not, I think, the least suc-
cess. I fail to see that in this supplementary deliverance any ground
of permanence for the ijossibilities of sensation is set forth, save only
in the concrete instances adduced, from which illicit conveyance is
made of it.

Sole possible Ground of it. 261

p. 12) 'are not real entities wliich can be felt as present
' when no effect foUows ; they are abstract names for the
' happening of the effect, on the concurrence of the needful
' conditions ; ' and plainly the one ' needful condition ' of
any effect whatever is the antecedence of its appropriate
cause. By ' permanent possibilities of sensation,' Mr MUl
must thus — as presumed a rational person — be held to mean
(or imply as their ground, which is pretty much the same
thing) permanent causes of sensation ; and it is solely as a
permanent entity guaranteed as cause of sensation, that
any one was ever asked, or can be asked, to believe in the
non-Ego of matter, or the existence of the external world.
Mr MiU is thus, as it seems to me, tied up to admit, as
cause, the non-Ego which he is doing what little he can to
argue out of existence. Unless, indeed — as Mr MUl might
almost seem to suppose — possibilities of sensation can sub-
sist, when all causes of sensation are abolished, — which is
not the less — pace Mr Mill — a palpably frantic proposition.
"When Mr MUl, therefore, writes, as we have seen him do,
of his ' permanent possibilities of sensation ' — except as
they imply as their ground the causal non-Ego which it is
the express aim of his theory to discredit — he merely, as
I said, deludes himself with a form of words, to which I
myself do not find it possible — after trying ever so — to
attach any rational meaning whatever.

Of Mr MiU's ' Psychological Theories ' I have nothing
farther to say. One more remark I may permit myself, and
it is simply this — that it is to me a little astounding that
such speculations — being, as they are, so worthless — should
have met with the acceptance accorded to them.

EEEATA.

Page 58. Since these sheets were printed off, dipping in the
'Memoirs of the Duke de Snlly,' I find that as regards Ravaillac,
my memory has played me false. I have said — "seeing he was a
priest," &c. — whereas he was not a priest, but only a lay-brother.
As I was putting a supposed case, let us suppose him to have been
a priest, and my text may remain as it is. In no case can my
ignorant blunder in the least affect my argument, though, on my
becoming aware of it, I may just as well point it out.

Page 93, note — "action of which, as motive," &o. — read motiiii.

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